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Yes, you can see the tops of the links inside the mast, near the arrow marked 36 in the last image.yasotay said:Upper pitch links are inside the upper hub I would think.
Yes, you can see the tops of the links inside the mast, near the arrow marked 36 in the last image.yasotay said:Upper pitch links are inside the upper hub I would think.
Triton said:Press Releases
S-97 RAIDER™ Helicopter Powered On for First Time As Next-Gen Rotorcraft Moves Closer to First Flight
June 16, 2014
Source:
http://www.sikorsky.com/About+Sikorsky/News/Press+Details?pressvcmid=28ec91bc074a6410VgnVCM1000004f62529fRCRD
Triton said:Sikorsky X2 concept for US Coast Guard.
Source:
http://www.tu.no/industri/2014/11/18/nordsjo-helikoptre-far-stealth-teknologi
Same space (maybe) in the back as a Dauphin and twice the speed. Looks like it could work when the Coast Guard looks to replace their current fleet.Triton said:Triton said:Sikorsky X2 concept for US Coast Guard.
Source:
http://www.tu.no/industri/2014/11/18/nordsjo-helikoptre-far-stealth-teknologi
I guess that the concept is actually a Sikorsky S-97 Raider in US Coast Guard colors.
yasotay said:Same space (maybe) in the back as a Dauphin and twice the speed. Looks like it could work when the Coast Guard looks to replace their current fleet.
Skyblazer said:I don't think they can extend the Dolphin's life long enough to wait for the Raider to be operational (which, if I'm not mistaken, is supposed to happen circa 2027...).
Sundog said:Raider? I would think it would be operational well before than if they have a customer. Do you mean JMR for 2027?
TomS said:USCG just started a new Dolphin upgrade (MH-65E) so I expect it will be around a while yet.
Triton said:If Sikorsky is to be believed that X2 Technology is a game changer, wouldn't the customer rather sell his obsolete fleet of rotorcraft and upgrade to X2 Technology?
Skyblazer said:Not if they can only get one X2-technology rotorcraft for the price of 12 more conventional ones...
Jemiba said:In most cases, an increase in performance in one field, say speed, doesn't
come without disadvantages in others, maybe stronger downwash. Or internal volume
is more restricted, due to the dynamic components placed inside the fuselage and not
mainly above, as in standard helis ? To fly to an oil rigg with 150 % of nowadays speed
isn't enough, when you have to fly the distance twice, because only half the number of
pax can be carried by an ABC vehicle of broadly the same weight.
The timeframe given by Skyblazer for the actual in-service date of the S-97 may not be
that unrealistic, especially not with regards to the civil offsprings, I think.
For the military the answer is yes. There is a reason that everyone talks about the 'golden hour'. For the US, it has been mandated by the Secretary of Defense.Triton said:Jemiba said:In most cases, an increase in performance in one field, say speed, doesn't
come without disadvantages in others, maybe stronger downwash. Or internal volume
is more restricted, due to the dynamic components placed inside the fuselage and not
mainly above, as in standard helis ? To fly to an oil rigg with 150 % of nowadays speed
isn't enough, when you have to fly the distance twice, because only half the number of
pax can be carried by an ABC vehicle of broadly the same weight.
The timeframe given by Skyblazer for the actual in-service date of the S-97 may not be
that unrealistic, especially not with regards to the civil offsprings, I think.
All important considerations in the general aviation market. We should also add fuel consumption and cost per flight hour to the list. But in time critical applications, would the customer also be willing to pay a performance premium for X2 Technology and accept less carrying capacity and other drawbacks of the technology, if present. I understand that the Sikorsky S-97 Raider is approximately the same size of a Airbus Helicopters EC-145. Would the Sikorsky S-97 be a better medevac helicopter application than the UH-72 Lakota or MH-60 Black Hawk when casualties need to arrive at the surgical hospital within the critical hour?
Triton said:Skyblazer said:Not if they can only get one X2-technology rotorcraft for the price of 12 more conventional ones...
Where did you get the 12x more expensive figure? Not that I am debating you, but I was under the impression that X2 Technology was price competitive, according to Sikorsky, to existing conventional helicopters.
John Young, the Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition, Technology and Logistics, cited the reason as excessive costs of the program which had increased over 70 percent with an estimated per-unit cost of US$14.5 million, up from US$8.5 million.
Agreed. If it cannot make the 'cost per seat/mile' value to the operator, or drastic productivity improvements, it will be exclusive to the military and para-military until such time as they can improve the technology to the point that it is fiscally viable for the civil operator.TomS said:Keep in mind that Sikorsky's $15 million figure is for a complete aircraft, but does not include mission equipment. So yes, this is a fair bit more expensive than a conventional helo (both to buy and to run). How could it not be, considering it has two or three times the installed power and a much more complex drivetrain? The question becomes, does that extra cost buy you enough enhanced mission capability to justify it? For many users, the answer is probably "no". For many military users, it may well be "yes."
The question of the day is which one of the rotorcraft is running a higher SFC for that ~ 230 it's cruise?Triton said:Screenshot showing Sikorsky X2 attack concept with Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey.
Source:
http://www.vidiho.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/sikorsky-x2-technology.jpg
yasotay said:It is nothing more than a ploy to promote the CH-53K for the heavy mission. That said, the weight associated with the X-2 dynamics probably does not scale that well.
Triton said:yasotay said:It is nothing more than a ploy to promote the CH-53K for the heavy mission. That said, the weight associated with the X-2 dynamics probably does not scale that well.
Looks like it was indeed a ploy to promote the CH-53K King Stallion.
sferrin said:Triton said:Looks like it was indeed a ploy to promote the CH-53K King Stallion.
How do you figure?
TomS said:I don't know if this larger X2 would be a direct competitor to the CH-53K in any case. Payload fraction for X2 is lower than a conventional helicopter (lots more machinery for a given MTOW). That means a 33,000-lb (empty) heavy-lift X2 will have a much lower payload than a 33,000-lb (empty) CH-53K.
Triton said:sferrin said:Triton said:Looks like it was indeed a ploy to promote the CH-53K King Stallion.
How do you figure?
Marketing 101. Sikorsky wants to sell as many CH-53K King Stallion helicopters as possible as a heavy lift solution. They cannot place doubt in the mind of the customer that something better is coming along that will encourage him or her to defer making the purchase decision.
sferrin said:TomS said:I don't know if this larger X2 would be a direct competitor to the CH-53K in any case. Payload fraction for X2 is lower than a conventional helicopter (lots more machinery for a given MTOW). That means a 33,000-lb (empty) heavy-lift X2 will have a much lower payload than a 33,000-lb (empty) CH-53K.
Where did you get the 33,000lb empty weight for the X2? ???
Sikorsky’s S-97 Raider has not yet flown, but the company is considering extending the aircraft’s coaxial rotor design to other platforms.
Chief executive Mick Maurer, speaking at the HAI Heli-Expo show on 3 March, says technology incorporated into the Raider, which was initially pitched as a replacement for the US Army’s Bell OH-58D Kiowa Warrior armed scout helicopter, could improve other platforms, although there are no firm plans to do so.
“The first applications that we expect for X2 are almost certainly going to be military,” Maurer says. “The reason for that is you’ve got to have a customer that buys enough of those for you to justify that big investment. The business case is very difficult to go out and speculatively do that on the commercial side.”
The Raider, which sports stiff coaxial rotors and a pusher propeller, is designed to take off, land and hover like a helicopter and fly fast and high like a fixed-wing aircraft. It is essentially in the weight and size-class as the S-76D medium class helicopter, Maurer notes.
“Raider is S-76 size. When you say -76 mission, not yet,” he says. “That’s not to say that we won’t eventually do that.”
The first S-97 prototype is complete and in ground test. So far, the first Raider has had 14 engine starts and has undergone a total 3.5h of ground testing. The aircraft will be put through 50h of pre-flight acceptance testing before it flies for the first time, Maurer says. The first bladed ground runs ended after achieving 85% of full rotor speed, he says.
There is no US government programme of record or official requirement for the S-97, but Sikorsky is basing its joint-multi role demonstrator on the technology. The SB-1 Defiant is a scaled-up version of the Raider that Sikorsky hopes will be chosen to replace the US Army’s H-60 Black Hawks and Boeing AH-64 Apache helicopters.
The company also is angling for the US Navy’s MH-XX maritime helicopter programme, but Maurer says coaxial rotors are not likely to be offered for that competition.
“I don’t want to presuppose a technical solution. That’s a possibility,” he says of a coaxial rotor configuration. “The tough thing with coax and the navy is fitting in a ship hangar. They want something that can be on station for a long time. So the premium on some of the things that a coax will do, let’s say for the army, in terms of mobility, high-hot performance, the speed for the army or even the Marine Corps, that proposition is a little different for the navy.
“I wouldn’t say never, but it doesn’t feel like that’s the right application for it,” Maurer adds.
Understand the K is a quite radical improvement, but believe it is stretching it to call it new and serious inefficiencies are not eliminated. Something like x2 is new but yes it seems not on the horizon. Again the gov is going to have to assume the risk of any tangible improvement.F-14D said:It's worth remembering that a year or two ago that Sikorsky itself said that X2 technology wouldn't scale up to the heavy lift category. If one looks back over this and similar topics, you'll see the discussions about the space needed for the mast and transmission it is apparent why they would say this.
Even if that situation didn't exist, any FVL heavy wouldn't come on line for at least another 20 years. USMC has to have something a lot sooner than that, as do other potential customers. So the timeframe alone dictates that CH-53K (which is a new helicopter that only has the shape of the earlier CH-53).