Un par de noticias relacionadas con el programa FVL. La primera es que Sikorsky-Boeing vuelve al túnel de viento con su prototipo para el FLRAA a escala 1/5:
https://www.janes.com/defence-news/news ... aa-testingLa segunda, y con la mente puesta en el FARA, es que el US Army busca municiones de precisión de largo alcance, con "demostraciones" en 2022:
https://www.flightglobal.com/helicopter ... 17.articleLas prisas vienen porque la integración en el FARA podría comenzar tan pronto como el FY2026, con entrada en servicio inicial tan solo dos años más tarde. Es por ese motivo por lo que quieren un diseño maduro, para evitar sorpresas. Me imagino que por eso no aclaran si quieren más alcance que el Spike NLOS (unos 32 km), simplemente podría ser un sondeo para ver lo que hay en el mercado.
Por su parte, continúa la maduración de los ALE ("Air launched Effects") dentro de la "Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (CCDC) PHASE II":
https://beta.sam.gov/opp/474088e7208f43 ... rue&page=1...
The Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (CCDC) Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Cyber, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (C5ISR) Center is currently working on Science and Technology (S&T) planning and development of ALE capability to deliver coordinated and distributed sensing and effects across Electro-Optical (EO), Infrared (IR) and Radio Frequency (RF) spectrums. The overall goal of this RFI is to identify novel and highly capable technologies and enablers that can inform S&T development to better align current and future S&T investment in technology areas of interest for ALE, inform ALE payload and platform requirements, and ultimately identify candidates for current and future ALE mission systems program acquisitions.
A Phase I of this RFI originated in August 2020 culminating in a Virtual Industry Day was held in Late October 2020, where the U.S. Government (USG) walked through details of this RFI and the Army’s vision for ALE concepts of operation and employment as well as discussions on specitic technologies of interest. Vendors submitted many questions prior to and during industry day. This Phase II RFI includes USG responses to the questions received in Phase I.
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Y ya por último, se lanzó otra RFI para los MSI ("Mission Systems Integrator") a finales de enero:
https://beta.sam.gov/opp/71bc9511787544 ... rue&page=1...
Description: PEO Aviation is interested in the use of MSIs to
leverage Government-procured technical data packages (TDP), Government-developed capabilities, and industry-developed systems as we migrate to an enterprise Modular Open System Approach (MOSA) solution space. Responses to this RFI should be targeted to meet the following PEO Aviation MOSA objectives:
improved affordability, increased readiness, enhanced capabilities, reduced schedule pressure, and reduced supply chain risk.
PEO Aviation seeks to obtain information to assess options for implementation of a MSI,
independent of Aircraft OEMs. For purposes of this RFI, MSI is defined as:
1. A
provider of a MOSA architecture that incorporates Government requirements for open standards, interfaces, software code, appropriate Intellectual Property / Data Rights, maximizes competition to include 4th party content, and does not require provider involvement for long-term sustainment and/or future upgrades.
2. An
interface to the Aircraft OEM to ensure the mission systems architecture is fully integrated with the overall aircraft architecture, complies with air vehicle constraints such as space/weight/power, and complies with the platform-specific schedule and affordability constraints.
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Lo que yo entiendo es que se buscan alternativas a los OEM ("Original Equipment Manufacturers") para integrar sistemas de misión. Parece que se quiere buscar competencia fuera de los grandes proveedores para tener mejor producto a un precio más contenido.