Sikorsky is continuing to advance a number of separate research programmes as it works to increase the amount of autonomy and automation available in its helicopters.
The Connecticut-headquartered rotorcraft manufacturer has since 2013 been flying its modified S-76B – known as SARA or Sikorsky Autonomy Research Aircraft – under its Matrix initiative. Technologies successfully validated by this testing are now making being utilised in other projects, such as the airframer’s self-funded effort to develop an optionally piloted (OPV) variant of the UH-60 Black Hawk.
Designed as a kit that can either be a retrofit or line-fit product, this has now completed its preliminary design review. Flight tests of the equipment are then likely to begin “late next year” says Igor Cherepinsky chief engineer for the autonomy programme.
Although funded internally by the company, the US Army, as the world’s biggest UH-60 operator, is clearly targeted as the eventual customer. The service is “waiting and watching” he adds.
In 2014 a modified Black Hawk was used to perform trials under the army’s MURAL programme to demonstrate autonomous cargo resupply missions. Data from these evaluations has since been used to further refined the UH-60 OPV systems, says Cherepinsky.
Additionally, a separate effort, in partnership with Carnegie Mellon university and the army’s Tank Automotive Development and Engineering Center, to demonstrate successful teaming between a unmanned ground vehicle and an autonomously controlled helicopter is progressing.
Initial interoperability trials – covering data links and carriage compatibility – were carried out earlier this year and will usher in testing of a more complex autonomous mission scenario later this year.
Sikorsky was also in March awarded a contract with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency covering the application of autonomous technology to the US military’s fleet of rotary- and fixed-wing aircraft under Phase 1 of its Aircrew Labor In-Cockpit Automation System (ALIAS) initiative.
First flight of the applications and devices it intends to use in the effort will be made “shortly” using the SARA vehicle, says Cherepinsky.
The initial stage ends later this year, with a second phase involving technology maturation beginning in 2016. The third part is likely to involve an eventual transition to production, but is yet to be defined, he says.
In addition, research using the SARA helicopters is continuing, although Cherepinsky says Sikorsky is presently “not disclosing” the exact nature of the latest sensors it is trialing.
SARA has accumulated a total of 78h of flight testing since 2013.
Source: Flight Daily News
