Bell Helicopter

Hungry For More Chopper Pilots, Navy Picks New Training Helo

The Navy will replace all 115 of its aged TH-57 Sea Ranger training helicopters with Leonardo’s AW119 helicopter.

Bell Pushes V-280 Gunship, Shipboard Variants: Recon In Works

One variant, in Army colors, has missile racks sticking out of what was originally the passenger cabin — a conversion that units could potentially install or remove as needed in the field. The other, with Marine Corps markings, is a sleeker thoroughbred gunship with internal weapons bays, stealth features, and folding wings to fit in shipboard hangars.

Romania Inches Forward On Major Attack Helo Deal

Romania, a NATO ally, is nervously watching Russian moves in the Black Sea, is spending big on American military kit.

Bell Update On ‘Amazing’ V-280

AUSA: Bell Helicopter is moving right along with its new V-280 Valor, a tiltrotor being built under the Army-led, multiservice Future Vertical Lift (FVL) program. The V-280 – which flies at 280 knots cruising speed — resembles the bigger V-22 Osprey built by Bell and Boeing for the Marine Corps, Air Force Special Operations Command […]

Bell V-280 Revs Rotors In First Ground Test

Bell’s V-280 tiltrotor didn’t take flight – not yet – but it has tilted its rotors into helicopter mode and spun them up during its first-ever “restrained ground run test.” This test mode plugs the whole aircraft into a bulky apparatus to ensure it doesn’t take off by accident. (That would be bad). The test […]

Bell V-280 Vs. Sikorsky-Boeing SB>1: Who Will Win Future Vertical Lift?

AMARILLO, TEX.: The Future Vertical Lift program aims to create revolutionary replacements for today’s military helicopters. But how? And why? The answers lie in the speed limits built into the physics of how a helicopter flies. Rival contractors Bell and Sikorsky (part of Lockheed Martin) both say they have transcended those limits to build dramatically […]

Kill Army Helo Upgrades & Build Super Chopper: Bell V-280 Exec

AMARILLO, TEX.: Bell Helicopter is so confident in their new V-280 tilt-rotor prototype that they want the Pentagon to accelerate the Future Vertical Lift program – which they think the V-280 will win – by “five to eight years.” [Click here for our head-to-head comparison of the V-280 and its rival, the Sikorsky-Boeing SB>1] That […]

MUX By 2026: Marines Want Armed Drone ASAP To Escort V-22

When V-22 Ospreys full of Marines take to the skies 10 years from now, they could be escorted by armed high-speed drones called MUX. That’s become the Marine Corps plan because drones let you do things differently. Doing without a pilot inside makes it possible to build unorthodox aircraft that would work poorly carrying tender humans. You […]

Tern Tailsitter Drone: Pilot Not Included

One of the oddest military drones aborning reinvents a stillborn technology from 1951. That’s because the unmanned aircraft revolution is resurrecting configurations that were tried more than a half century ago but proved impractical with a human pilot inside. The case in point: Northrop Grumman’s new Tern, a drone designed to do everything armed MQ-1 Predators […]

DARPA Do-It-All Drone Among New VTOLs Nearing Flight

A bevy of new vertical take off and landing (VTOL) aircraft conceived to take the military beyond the speed, range and altitude limits of helicopters are scheduled to fly over the next two years. None looks more like science fiction becoming science fact than a sort of flying candy crane formerly known as “Transformer.” What is now […]

Bell’s V-280 Tiltrotor Is Part F-35

AUSA: Bell Helicopter’s exhibit at this week’s Association of the United States Army convention includes a full-scale mockup of the V-280 Valor, the new tiltrotor the company is building. From the outside, it sure looks like a close cousin of the V-22 Osprey. Under the skin, the V-280 seems a lot more like a prop-driven F-35. The […]

Fly With Us (Kinda) In Bell’s V-280 Valor Tiltrotor VIDEO

AUSA: I’m not a pilot, but today I played a copilot in a flight simulator Bell Helicopter brought to the Association of the United States Army annual convention to show what its next tiltrotor, the V-280 Valor, will be able to do. As my pilot in the simulator, former Army aviator and test pilot Steve Kihara, […]

Month After Us, Bell Unveils V-247 Vigilant Tiltrotor Drone

Bell Helicopter confirmed Thursday what the deputy commandant of the Marine Corps, Lt. Gen. Jon “Dog” Davis, told Breaking Defense a month ago. The company is designing a new tiltrotor drone about the size of the Air Force’s armed MQ-9 Reaper, with similar capabilities, that it hopes the Marines will buy. They call it the V-247 […]

EXCLUSIVE: Meet Bell’s V-247, Armed Tiltrotor Drone For Marines

PENTAGON: A sleek little model sits on the desk of Lt. Gen. Jon “Dog” Davis, Marine deputy commandant for aviation. What is that, we asked? The next tiltrotor Bell Helicopter Textron hopes the Marine Corps will buy. But it’s not the V-280 Valor, the new manned tiltrotor Bell plans to fly next year. It’s an […]