The unique aircraft would combine the
hover and maneuver capability of a
helicopter with the high flight speed of
a jet onto one platform. Bell showed off three similar airframes.
The smallest would apparently be
unmanned, while the larger of the two
clearly house a cockpit in the airframe
nose. The largest of the three would
apparently be about double the size of
the V-22 Osprey. An earlier tilt rotor
aircraft also built by Bell.
In theory Bell's hsvtol aircraft could
operate independently of runways and
conduct various missions, including cargo
transport, troop insertion and search and
rescue. Though indeed a flexible platform there
may however be a problem. Although Bell's three hs vtol aircraft
would indeed offer the warfighter some
new capabilities, some of the three
aircraft's features raise questions.
First, although all three seem to feature
some stealthy characteristics like a
canted tail and apparently stealthily
contoured fuselages.
Second, the largest of the three's engine
intake is located at the top of the
airframe's fuselage, which would help to
hide the intake from enemy radar and
help preserve the airframe's low radar
signature. However one glaring shortcoming of the
hsvtol aircraft's stealthy design is the
oversized rotors they'd use when
hovering.
Even when folded back during horizontal
flight, they still offer enemy air
defenses a complex surface that could
reflect rather than deflect radar waves
and potentially negating any stealth
advantage achieved by their other
stealthy features. Another potential issue could be the
extra weight inherent to a multi-engine
design.
While in horizontal flight, the hsvtol
aircraft's rotors would be useless
creating parasitic drag that adversely
affects flight performance and increases
airframe weight.
Bell HS VTOL has several other somewhat similar
airframes in the works besides these
hsvtol concepts. in addition to the company's successful V-22 Osprey Tiltrotor, the company is
also working on another tilt rotor for
the army's future vertical lift program.
Their V-280 valor is a sleek looking
aircraft that although smaller than the V-22 offers some advantages including
fixed engine nisellas for better
performance.
Still, Bell certainly has many decades of
aircraft design experience it can
leverage for this new HS VTOL design
perhaps concerns about their HS VTOL aircraft are overblown. Still, until Bell builds and tests
prototype aircraft speculation as at
best speculative.
