Source: Sikorsky
Source: Sikorsky
Source: Sikorsky
Source: Sikorsky
Most noticeably, the helicopter’s exhaust outlets have been covered with a shroud to reduce its infrared signature, a precaution against heat-seeking missiles. The rotorcraft’s landing gear configuration was changed from two mid-section wheels and a tail wheel to a layout that includes a nose wheel, two mid-section wheels and a small wheel under the tail.
“We’ve made some changes to the landing gear for a tricycle design landing gear, which improves both stability, but then landing and taxiing in combat and austere environments,” says Heather McBryan, Boeing’s sales and marketing director of Future Vertical Lift.
By Dan Parsons | January 25, 2021
Estimated reading time 10 minutes, 45 seconds.
Sikorsky and Boeing have unveiled a refined vision of the Defiant compound coaxial helicopter, the team’s ultimate pitch to replace the U.S. Army’s Black Hawk helicopters with a speedy Future Long Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA).
The companies have released splashy renderings of the “Defiant X” and a video showing it performing demanding battlefield duty cruising through forested ravines with an underslung artillery cannon, landing troops in combat formation but were cagey with reporters about how the new design improves on the SB>1 Defiant prototype currently flying.
The Defiant X, a version of the SB>1 coaxial compound helicopter optimized for aerodynamic efficiency and reduced thermal and acoustic signature. Defiant Team Image
Lockheed-Boeing team pitch Defiant X, its candidate for the Army’s long-range assault helo competition January 25
Lockheed Martin and Boeing unveiled its offering to the U.S. Army s Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft competition Jan. 25, 2021 calling it Defiant X. (Artistic rendering courtesy of Lockheed Martin and Boeing) The modified, competition-ready aircraft design is being called Defiant X, taking the same surname as little brother Raider X, which is Lockheed’s submission for the Army’s other helicopter competition the Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft (FARA) program running nearly in parallel. Both aircraft build off and scale up from Sikorsky’s X2 demonstrator which flew for the first time in 2008.