The US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has awarded a contract to BAE Systems to design a full scale demonstrator concept with Active Flow Control at its core.
BAE Systems says the aircraft’s ability to manoeuver in flight without conventional flight control surfaces will 'enable improved performance, maintainability, and survivability.'
The contract award forms part of DARPA’s Control of Revolutionary Aircraft with Novel Effectors (CRANE) project, which intends to inject Active Flow Control technology early into the aircraft design process to "demonstrate significant efficiency benefits," as well as "improvements to aircraft cost, weight, performance, and reliability."
BAE Systems’ role in Project CRANE builds on a demonstration in 2019 where a subscale aircraft was successfully maneuvered in flight using supersonically blown air and Active Flow Control technologies for the first time in aviation history.
“This award enables us to progress Active Flow Control and our digital engineering capabilities at full scale, in collaboration with DARPA and the University of Manchester in the UK," Tom Fillingham, Senior Vice President – US Programs, BAE Systems Air Sector said. "Since our groundbreaking trials, our engineers across the UK, US, and Australia have continued to innovate to identify improvements in the aircraft digital design process to deliver military value and operational advantages to the warfighter.”
As military aircraft confront increasingly contested and sophisticated threat environments, Active Flow Control offers potential military benefits that could deliver operational advantage in the battlespace.
Active Flow Control technologies can supplement or replace conventional moveable control surfaces to improve the performance of an aircraft at various points in the flight regime, as well as reduce mass and volume compared to aircraft with conventional controls to enable greater payloads and greater flexibility to the operator.
The contract will see BAE Systems mature design, integration, and de-risking activities, including wind tunnel testing at its facilities in England in 2022.
This work will inform future phases of the CRANE program, including the concept design activity.