Bell's V-280 Valor Tiltrotor Picked as Army's Black Hawk Replacement (2022)

https://www.twz.com/bells-v-280-valor-tiltrotor-picked-as-armys-black-hawk-replacement

by dralley • 2 years ago

44 58 2 years ago

dralley5• 2 years ago

* Tiltrotor design, similar in principle to the V-22 Osprey but mechanically much less complicated than the Osprey mechanism, and more stable due to lower disk loading

* Current max speed of 345mph

* Current max range of 2,400 miles

* Capable of unmanned flight

* Helmet allows the pilot to see through the body of the aircraft using AR

Seanambers• 2 years ago

This thing can actually cross the Atlantic hot damn.

8organicbits• 2 years ago

A touch screen? I'd think something tactile would be better. As a driver, I hate my touch screen radio because I have to look at what I'm touching and avoid accidental contact.

stonogo2• 2 years ago

Since the introduction in the early 2000s of the so-called "glass cockpit" the current norm is multi-function displays surrounded with "soft buttons" whose functions change depending on the currently-displayed screen. In practice there's not much benefit to this over a touchscreen, since you have to verify the button you're about to press is currently set to the function you want. Since the touchscreen has fewer moving parts, I'd wager the maintenance and production costs are much lower.

masklinn3• 2 years ago

similar in principle to the V-22 Osprey but mechanically much less complicated than the Osprey mechanism, and more stable due to lower disk loading

Being much lighter / less capable than the v22, 30 years younger, and the Navy not being involved, help a lot with everything.

SEJeff3• 2 years ago

The irony here, is that an F35 has a max range of ~1,380 miles by comparison, though obviously an F35 can do in-flight refueling.

thunderbird120• 2 years ago

Wasn't really very surprising when this happened. The V-280 demonstrator was running laps around the competing program (the SB-1 Defiant) in pretty much every category the army really cared about. Tiltrotors let you fly dramatically further, dramatically faster than conventional helicopters, and on top of all of that the actual technical maturity of Bell's prototype was light years beyond what Sikorsky managed with the SB-1, getting eventually retired only because they basically ran out of things to test.

The SB-1 had constant issues due to the requirements of the program. Making a helicopter go that fast introduces a lot of complexity, to the point that the SB-1 was really not any less complex than the V-280. Essentially its only winning points were in better hover performance and a slightly smaller footprint but those weren't enough to justify having dramatically slower speed and half the range for an aircraft whose main purpose is to act as a transport.

dralley5• 2 years ago

Also the thing was tall as f** and therefore likely just as difficult if not more difficult to service.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FPmihf_WUAICL4y?format=jpg&name=...

wolverine8768• 2 years ago

FWIW, I read stories about it at the time (interested in the technology, not Pentagon contracting competitions). What I read before the announcement thought the outcome was unknown, and nobody before or after presented it as lopsided. Certainly I didn't read everything, so YMMV.

sparrish• 2 years ago

Those crayon-eating grunts are gonna end up shooting the blades off the V-280... you watch. <grin>

meepmorp2• 2 years ago

crayon-eating

This is for the Army, not the Marines

warner257• 2 years ago

I believe that this is ultimately supposed to replace not just the Black Hawk but the Army's Apache and Marine Corps' Cobra too. I recently had a conversation with a Marine Corps Cobra pilot who had real concerns about the configuration that a tiltrotor needs to be in when employing weapons.

psunavy03• 2 years ago

"The story does not necessarily end with the Army's decision. Lockheed Martin, which owns Sikorsky could very well protest the decision, which will put the entire program on hold at least for 100 days while the Government Accountability Office weighs its counterargument."

And this is the screwed-up state of DoD procurement in 2024 . . .

dr_orpheus• 2 years ago

"put the entire program on hold at least for 100 days"

I don't think the wording here is quite right. The GAO has 100 days to decide if the protest is valid or not. If it is valid, then the program could be on hold for longer. The GAO could decide day 1 "nope, your protest is not valid" (they won't). Most likely it will be closer to 100 days of the program on hold, but it shouldn't be "at least 100 days".

But it also just any government procurement in general, where a protest is par for the course. Common amongst any large NASA procurement as well:

https://spacenews.com/gao-denies-l3harris-protest-over-ball-...

It is also happens often because even if a company doesn't think they have a valid protest the government will have to release more details of the proposals and so it is often used as a way to gain business intel.

MilStdJunkie• 2 years ago

Defiant was one of those rare projects where Lockheed and Boeing were teamed up, which helped the program not at all. The Valor had a laser-focus, by comparison. I had the good fortune to have a tiny toe in both programs.

"But wait," I hear you ask, "why didn't Boeing supply a design of their own? Don't they make the CH-47"

Well . . that's a long story, but the short version is that the 47 was designed a long, long time ago, and it's a Vertol design, not Boeing. Editorial warning, but I'm not sure Boeing has the ability to design a whole lot, these days.

ThisIsMyAltAcct• 2 years ago

Valor is set to enter service in the mid-2030s

That seems like a long time

dralley5• 2 years ago

I think that's either wrong or outdated, they're aiming for the first ones to be in service by the end of 2030. But of course it will take years (probably a decade) to replace the entire fleet.

warner257• 2 years ago

This has been a mildy controversial decision, and I was initially concerned that the Valor was the wrong choice, but I've convinced myself over the past year that it wasn't.

In the mid-2000s, the Army decided to cancel the technologically revolutionary, expensive, and long-delayed RAH-66 and Congress allowed it to reinvest the RAH-66 money into known quantities like UH-60, CH-47, and AH-64 instead. We got whole new fleets of those aircraft with upgraded capabilities, and then we all saw how they were reliable workhorses over the last 20 years in Iraq and Afghanistan. I think that choosing the Valor reflects this lesson-learned. The Defiant was the riskier new technology while Bell's tiltrotor design is more mature after many years of feedback and optimization from V-22 operations. If we actually want to get something out of this program, the right decision is probably to "not let perfect be the enemy of good." The more mature design is probably going to be the safer one for aircrews and troops, the easier one to maintain, etc.

My remaining disappointment is that the Defiant reportedly had better hover power under high and hot conditions which is what we really needed in Afghanistan. The CH-47's much greater hover power compared to the UH-60 turned the CH-47 into the preferred (sometimes only) platform for air assaults and everything else. I wonder if we could have done very well by just continuing to iterate on and build more CH-47s to replace some or all of the UH-60s in our assault helicopter battalions.

wolverine8768• 2 years ago

In the mid-2000s, the Army decided to cancel the technologically revolutionary, expensive, and long-delayed RAH-66 and Congress allowed it to reinvest the RAH-66 money into known quantities like UH-60, CH-47, and AH-64 instead. We got whole new fleets of those aircraft with upgraded capabilities, and then we all saw how they were reliable workhorses over the last 20 years in Iraq and Afghanistan. I think that choosing the Valor reflects this lesson-learned. ... If we actually want to get something out of this program, the right decision is probably to "not let perfect be the enemy of good." ...

That seems to be the Department of Defense's general approach these days, but I wonder if they are just fighting the last war. Against forces that are already massively outgunned, such as ISIL or the Taliban who generally had only rifles, explosives, and RPGs, improving technology generally doesn't help. Against 'near-peer' foes (the euphemism for China), it may pay to invest in the truly exceptional, ground-breaking technology - you don't want your ship or city defended by good-enough, economical fighters and anti-air; you want to see some X-wing fighters up there shooting lasers at their old turbine and missile buggies; you want what stealth bombers looked like next to the Soviet fleet.

That said, tilt-rotors are still a big step forward from standard helicopters.

mandevil2• 2 years ago

With the obvious caveat that if there ever actually is a shooting war with China on one side and the US on the other then the whole world is in serious trouble and there are no good options:

I am not sure that having superior technology is critical to winning wars against "peer" competitors. The last time there was a full out peer-competitor bleeding edge war between major powers (World War Two) the side that invested in a few wonderwaffen that were supposed to eviscerate their larger number of enemies lost, and the side that invested in a lot of pretty good weapons and most importantly, the logistics and reliability to have these pretty good weapons actually show up at the battlefront won the war. It's hard to directly translate this into modern terms, but I would say that a few pieces of "exceptional, ground-breaking technology" wasn't what decided World War Two, so why do you think it would decide this hypothetical war?

warner257• 2 years ago

You're right, this is always the tension because we're assuming risks either way. My half-serious CH-47 proposal, in particular, is probably the extreme version of "fighting the last war."

I think the consensus within the DoD by the mid to late-2000s was that the pendulum had swung way too far in the direction of technologically advanced but small and expensive, and there was a cultural revolution to swing things back in the other direction. Senior DoD and service leaders today are really a product of that.

I read a fresh opinion piece just yesterday arguing that we're still erring on the side of being too small and expensive, with which I tend to agree: https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2024/01/pentagon-has-been-l...

SkyMarshal• 2 years ago

The US military is retooling for war in the far-flung islands of East Asia. The Valor's range and speed advantage is critical there, and combined with its technical maturity, made it an almost shoe-in for winning this competition. It's also useful for the Marines who are reorienting completely around East Asia, so Bell may get to sell some to them too.

The Defiant is pretty cool though and I hope there's a commercial future for it. It may be attractive for large multinationals to replace their corporate helicopter fleets with, or for industrial uses that need a helicopter with greater load-lifting capacity than most others.

aredox• 2 years ago

This machine looks like the Osprey done right. I hope it becomes a new staple of military and civilian aircrafts.

masklinn3• 2 years ago

It’s a bit hard to say that it’s an osprey done right when it’s so much less. Not sure Valor would have been a consideration (or indeed a possibility) back in the 80s.

It’s an osprey done with a smaller scope, less capability, and 30 years later (thus having drawn from the osprey’s design and operational experience).

dralley5• 2 years ago

Less capability in most respects but it does have twice the range.

jameshart2• 2 years ago

How does this choice play into the longstanding fuzzy line between US Army and US Air Force responsibilities? This is neither fixed wing nor rotary wing; has the range for tactical airlift…

Is Johnson-McConnell still considered binding? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnson-McConnell_agreement_of...

jauntywundrkind• 2 years ago

I ponder this too. Very interesting modern development. And am happy to see the hughly-dogmatic line somewhat slipping.

The AH-56 Cheyenne stands out as what could have been an absurdly well equipped very fast helicopter. Speed, and a huge 360 degree underbelly turreted cannon would have been a ridiculous fire support craft. But it had a pusher prop on the back and the Air Force really really really didn't like that at the time (and was also probably hella jealous of the cannon too).

I'm not sure what makes me as ok with I am at eroding the air force's role somewhat. Some is probably seeing these great craft (AH-56, V280) & feeling like: if the army is going to have anything in the air, it should be great. It sure feels like the v280 is heralding in a massive shift in policy/what is permitted.

icegreentea2• 2 years ago

It does help that tilt rotars are totally rotary craft...

In any case, V-280 being primarily transport is for sure helpful. While the range might raise some eyebrows, it also means that V-280 can potentially more meaningfully self-deploy. That means less USAF strategic lift assets to spend on the army - USAF is pondering how it can keep forward bases supplied in the Indo-Pacific - strategic lift certainly has a role to play here.

I think the reality is that USAF realizes that trying to stonewall the V-280 will NOT meaningfully give it more budget, and that the V-280's capabilities means USAF gets more effective budget.

warner257• 2 years ago

There's some interesting recent history involving the C-27 Spartan. The Army saw a capability gap between its CH-47 and the Air Force C-130 for intra-theater, tactical lift in Iraq and Afghanistan, so it pursued the acquisition of this small fixed-wing cargo aircraft. There was another agreement for the Army to give that up in favor of the Air Force continuing the program, but the DoD / Air Force quickly reneged and canceled the program. The Army ended up relying on a lot of contract airlift support instead.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alenia_C-27J_Spartan#United_St...

Looking at the Indo-Pacific theater, I think it's clear to everybody that there's a serious shortage of capable airlift and sealift assets across the board.

openasocket• 2 years ago

The line is fuzzy and getting fuzzier with every passing day. I wouldn't even consider the introduction of the tiltrotor to be the best example of that. The US Army straight up operates the MQ-1C, which is a derivative of the predator drone. That's an armed fixed wing aircraft! I haven't been able to find any statement from the Army explaining how that isn't a complete breach of Johnson-McConnell. The only thing I can think of is that it's unmanned?

Actually it doesn't just call Johnson-McConnell into question, it would seem to defy the Key West agreement as well

tastyfreeze• 2 years ago

I was starting to think this thing would never enter production. I would love to see these in civilian use. Better that a helicopter or an airplane for a lot of remote site uses.

throwaway8877• 2 years ago

This thing looks highly vulnerable. Can it float when there is an issue with its engines?

loloquwowndueo2• 2 years ago

Vulnerable to what exactly? Engine failure? It has two engines (like the Blackhawk) and either can drive both rotors if the other fails.

Do helicopters typically float?

meepmorp2• 2 years ago

Helicopters can autorotate in the case of engine failure, maybe that's what they meant?

exabrial2• 2 years ago

Taking "float" literally meaning float in water: It's probably safer than a helicopter? I can't remember the name of the effect, but a helicopter in water automatically flips upside down because the heavy engines are mounted on the top. This causes the majority of deaths in helicopter water landings, even in shallow water, because the occupants can't egress due to disorientation.

The real question is does it flip upside down if it goes belly first into water.

Taking "float" meaning can it land: The blades in the V280 are connected so one engine can drive both props. This thing can also glide AND/or auto-rotate if needed... so I think it'd be pretty danged safe with a competent pilot.

exabrial2• 2 years ago

I honestly thought there was a scenario where they accept _both_ prototypes as winners.

They're both quite good at different missions.

Bell's V-280 Valor Tiltrotor Picked as Army's Black Hawk Replacement (2022)

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