First Hover Flight Test of X-50A Dragonfly

kbielefe writes "On Wednesday, flight testing began on the X-50A dragonfly canard rotor wing unmanned aircraft. For those of you not familiar with the dragonfly, its rotors work like a helicopter for takeoff, hovering, and slow-speed manouvering, and then lock into place like a fixed-wing aircraft for cruising. The X-50A's reaction drive makes it "much lighter, simpler and more affordable to operate and support than traditional rotorcraft." And the technology is scalable to larger, manned vehicles. Truly a revolutionary aircraft, with a multitude of potential military and commercial applications." There are some more photos and artwork.

Comments

Deathtrap?

[The Snowman]

So far, our attempts at bridging the gaps between helicopters and fixed wing aircraft have met with disaster. Take the Osprey, for example. I don't know who it was but he said that it took the worst features of both types of aircraft and mashed them together with poor engineering. Hopefully this new aircraft does not suffer the fate of the Osprey... and her pilots.

Re:Deathtrap?

[sllim]

Can I assume you are a 19 year old AMERICAN college Sophmore?

Yeah, actually I do think you should at least have heard of this.

The Osprey is supposed to be a replacement for the very aged Chinook helicopters.
If ever the military had a vehicle that outlived its usefulness it was the Chinook.
My father was in 'Nam and he tells me that he couldn't get out of those things fast enough. They were flying bullseyes as far as he was concerned.

The Osprey has the range and speed of a propeller aircraft but the VTOL capability, and the hover ability of a helicpoter.
This is acomplished by putting extremely large propeller (turboprop) engines on the end of the wings. The largest damn propellers you are ever going to see. The ends of the wings actually rotate 90 degrees to facilitate take off and landings.

When they first started testing this thing they found a lot of flaws. Some where engineering problems, but there is one nasty one they have been working on.

The engines can create an unusual vortex that has never really been seen before. When this vortex happens they loose lift and control of the aircraft and it crashes.

Is it a bad aircraft that we need to give up on?

I don't really know.

John Glenn seems to think the Shuttle's are flying death traps and we were better off putting capsules on top of rockets.

The Hubble was a real mess when it was first put in orbit as well. There was an enormous public outcry after the press labeled it 'a failure'.
Hmmmm some failure.

The B-1 bomber also suffered a number of crashes in testing.

Aviation is HARD and DANGEROUS. Someone else already said it for me, it is about time we took the 'pilot' out of test pilot. I can only imagine what the difference in public perception would be if the Osprey had gone through an unmanned testing phase.

The Osprey does hold tremendous promise though. If we can iron out the problems in it, it really would be a new category of aircraft. Something that can economicaly provide city to city air service, something that can bridge the gap between helicopter and airplane.

While I am not yet convinced that they can get a grip on the vortex problem, I am very far away from saying they need to give up.

Re:Deathtrap?

[Moofie]

Uh, so how many Marines can you deliver into hostile territory with an A-10?

I'm pretty sure the number is awfully close to zero.

There are NO armored airborne personnel carrying vehicles. Zero. That means, if you're flying in a C-130 or a Sea Stallion, that there is pretty well nothing between you and fiery death at the hands of bad guys.

It's a problem that is solved by tactics. The Osprey permits a larger variety of tactics (because it's faster and longer-ranged than other heavy lift helicopters).

Being in the Army is dangerous. That's what soldiers sign up for. It's up to the engineers (that's me) to provide them with the best possible hardware to complete their missions, but there is no such thing as a "safe" combat insertion vehicle.