11 octobre 2019 | International, Aérospatial
Sikorsky has dialed up the autonomous flight control system on an experimental UH-60A Black Hawk to where a pilot can “set it and forget it” during long surveillance missions, another step toward flying the aircraft remotely from the cabin or from the ground without pilots on board.
To date, Sikorsky has put 54.5 flight hours on its optionally piloted vehicle (OPV) flight control system, which is designed as a kit that replaces all legacy mechanical controls in existing aircraft with its MATRIX autonomous fly-by-wire controls. It has also run about 30 hours on the ground in the UH-60A, one of the oldest Black Hawks in the Army's inventory, according to chief test pilot Mark Ward.
During the first of MATRIX in a Black Hawk in May, Sikorsky focused on the direct mode control scheme, which means the fly-by-wire controls should fly and respond to pilot input like a conventional UH-60 Black Hawk, Ward said. Technically, the mode is “direct stick-to-head with stability augmentation in the loop.”
“Direct mode is supposed to be, more-or-less the service mode or an emergency mode, but we found the aircraft behaved quite well throughout all the speed regimes in that mode,” he said.
Sikorsky briefly paused the flight test program to “fine tune” some of the pilot control augmentation modes, “so that when we go to autonomy we're going to have a very mature system that goes from full-spectrum of pilot 100 percent in the loop, to autonomy 100 percent in the loop and everywhere in between,” he said.
Test pilots have since ratcheted up computer control of the aircraft and expanded the flight envelope out to 150 knots indicated airspeed. Most interestingly, the test team is beginning to increase the level of flight control augmentation beginning with “direct mode.”
In “rate command attitude hold” mode, the fly-by-wire system takes over more control of the aircraft, Ward said. That mode was tested through low-speed hover maneuvers out to 150 knots.
“When you put a control input, you're controlling a rate or an attitude change and when you release the control, you're capturing that attitude,” he said.
From there, test pilots increased autonomous control of the aircraft to the full authority control scheme, or FACS, in which “rather than commanding a rate, you're actually commanding a parameter, such as airspeed or altitude or heading using the control stick,” Ward said.
“To change from one mode to the next is simply a button push away to go from direct to rate command, up to FACS and back down,” he said. “Think of full authority as being an ultra-stable ISR platform that is going to be holding flight parameters for very long periods of time,” he said. “You kind of want to set it and forget it. You're not turning knobs on a flight director. You are actually flying the aircraft with the control stick.”
“Rate command is when you kind of want to . . . throw it around a little bit, you want to do some low-and-slow or low-and-fast maneuvering where you're going from stop to stop to complete a mission.”
Sikorsky uses the phrase “optimally piloted vehicle” as well as “optionally piloted vehicle” when discussing OPV and MATRIX because the ultimate goal is to develop a system that can act as an autonomous co-pilot quietly but constantly aiding human operators during specific missions.
The OPV kit is tailored to the UH-60, but is retrofittable onto the Army's entire helicopter fleet and Sikorsky's commercial S-92 and S-97 rotorcraft, according to Igor Cherepinsky, the company's director of autonomy. Sometime in 2020, Sikorsky will demonstrate that the system can be remotely piloted from both inside and outside the aircraft, he said.
“We will show the world this system is capable of being operated from the ground,” he said. Sikorsky continues to demonstrate MATRIX on a modified S-76B called the Sikorsky Autonomy Research Aircraft (SARA). The aircraft, which has been in test since 2013, has more than 300 hours of autonomous flight. The company announced in March that its S-92 helicopter fleet update will include the introduction of phase one MATRIX technology, which will allow for autonomous landing.
The U.S. Army has plans to outfit a UH-60M with the system but is about six months behind Sikorsky's OPV test program.
“Our vision is, obviously, not to replace the pilots, but to augment the pilots,” Cherepinsky said. “Once we field the technology, we never want to see another controlled flight into terrain or degraded visual environment issue accident ever happen with any of our aircraft.”
16 décembre 2021 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité
U.S. Defense Department strikes a balance between raising tensions with Beijing and its case for urgent modernization.
31 janvier 2019 | International, Aérospatial, Naval, Terrestre, C4ISR, Sécurité, Autre défense
By: Aaron Mehta WASHINGTON — In a move outside of its normal budgeting cycle directly aimed at the question of burden-sharing with allies, Denmark has agreed to increase its long-term defense spending. A coalition of parties in the Danish parliament have agreed to tack on 1.5 billion kroner (U.S. $229.7 million) to the agreed-upon defense budget for 2023, which would put defense spending at 1.5 percent of gross domestic product for that year. “It is on a good and well thought through basis that the parties to the defense agreement have now decided to further strengthen Danish defense, so that we will spend 1.5% of GDP in 2023,” Danish Defence Minister Claus Hjort Frederiksen said in a statement. “Danish status and reputation in NATO is of common concern and I would like to thank all parties for shouldering the responsibility.” The amendment comes less than one year after a coalition of parties agreed to a five-year defense spending agreement that planned for a 20 percent growth in military spending, from $3.8 billion in 2018 to $4.6 billion in 2023. It also comes just months before elections are set for Denmark, essentially removing the question of increased defense spending from the campaign. Just where that money will go is undecided at the moment. Denmark was already focused on standing up a light infantry battalion for national and international use; increasing anti-aircraft capabilities; buying the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter; and the creation of a special cyberwarfare unit. It is possible those capabilities could receive a funding boost. One thing is clear: The move is directly the result of a desire to support NATO amid calls from the Trump administration over fairer burden-sharing. In a statement, the political coalition notes “the Alliance has in the recent year taken important steps to further strengthen NATO's readiness and deterrence posture. The situation increases requirements to the Alliance and has reinforced the debate on fair burden sharing and Allies ability and will to defend themselves and each other. In light of this development Allies have taken new decisions to allocate additional resources to the armed forces towards 2024.” In addition to the spending increase, Denmark is changing how it reports its spending to NATO in order to “make sure the Danish defence efforts are duly reflected in the reporting to NATO.” Those changes will up Denmark's reported NATO support to 3 billion kroner annually from 2023 onward. Whether the increase will be enough to placate U.S. President Donald Trump remains to be seen. Trump has consistently called for European allies to spend more on defense, with a focus on hitting the target of spending 2 percent of GDP on defense, set at the 2014 Wales Summit. https://www.defensenews.com/global/europe/2019/01/30/denmark-ups-defense-budget/
3 décembre 2019 | International, Naval
By: David B. Larter WASHINGTON – The U.S. Navy on Monday awarded its largest-ever shipbuilding contract to General Dynamics Electric Boat for construction of nine Virginia-class attack submarines, eight of which will have 84-foot section that boosts the boat's strike missile capacity. The contract for the Block V Virginias, worth $22.2 billion, could grow by another $2 billion if the Navy exercises an option for a 10th boat. The contract is for two fewer boats than the 11 proposed by the fleet in this year's budget submission. “A lot of hard work across the whole team to structure the contract in such a was as to balance risk between the government and the shipbuilder,” said James Geurts, the Navy's top acquisition official, in a roundtable with members of the media to announce the contract signing. “If the shipbuilder delivers on target, the multi-year savings will be 16.5 percent, or $4.4 billion in savings. So, it's a pretty important day for us.” Guerts, the assistant Secretary of the Navy for research, acquisition and development, said that when you add government furnished equipment into the contract, the total swells to about $35 billion. The first boat in Block V, SSN 802, is currently under construction but does not have the Virginia Payload Module. The next boat, 803, will have VPM. All of the boats will have an upgraded acoustics suite. In the briefing, Navy officials said that six of the boats would be constructed at Electric Boat's partner yard, Huntington Ingalls Newport News, and three would be built at Electric Boat. The 10th boat would go to Electric Boat if the Navy exercised the option. The move to put most of the work in Newport News was done to balance the increased workload at Electric Boat with the start of the Columbia class, the next generation of ballistic missile submarines slated to begin construction this year. In a statement, Electric Boat President Kevin Graney said the contract provides stability for his shipyard. “This contract allows for our shipbuilding team, out suppliers and our employees to plan ahead so that we can continue to deliver submarines of unmatched quality, stealth and lethality,” Graney said. Dave Bolcar, Newport News' vice president of submarine construction, likewise hailed the contract as a means of stability in the submarine industrial base. "Today's contract maintains the Virginia-class build rate that provides continued stability to our workforce and to the 5,000 suppliers that will support submarines for the next decade,” he said. "This contract also continues the two per year construction cadence essential to sustaining production efficiencies, while ensuring our national security and the Navy's continued undersea superiority.” https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2019/12/02/navy-awards-largest-ever-shipbuilding-contract-to-electric-boat-for-new-attack-submarines