Rotorcraft manufacturer Bell will deliver the first example of the US Army’s next-generation tiltrotor in 2026, with the type’s first flight coming that same year.
That is according to the chief financial officer of Bell parent Textron, who notes that the Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) recently achieved full status as a programme of record with the army.
“We feel very good about the progress that we’re making,” Frank Connor said on 5 September. “We are continuing to work with the customer on releasing engineering drawings, getting supply chain in place, all the things that go with this phase of the programme.”
Connor spoke at a Gabelli industrial conference in New York City.
Bell’s FLRAA design recently achieved what is known as Milestone B in Pentagon procurement jargon – a key step toward aircraft production. Milestone B marks the official start of an acquisition programme, beginning with an engineering and manufacturing development (EMD) phase that precedes low-rate initial production.
“We’re working through that EMD phase,” Connor says. “The next big step is first flight in 2026.”
The army revealed in August that FLRAA had hit Milestone B, a designation accompanied by funding to cover delivery of six prototype aircraft. Connor says the first of those will be turned over to the army in 2026 for flight testing and evaluations.
Should the prototypes meet the service’s requirements, Bell will be approved for Milestone C – a transition into low-rate initial production (LRIP).
In the interim, Bell must decide where to produce the FLRAA aircraft, which could see thousands of orders over its lifetime.
Textron chief executive Scott Donnelly told FlightGlobal in July that the leading candidate remains Amarillo, Texas – home to assembly lines for Bell’s V-22 Osprey tiltrotor and UH-1/AH-1 family of helicopters.
“I absolutely believe Amarillo will be our final assembly operations,” Donnelly said at the 2024 Farnborough air show. “The workforce there has done a spectacular job on our V-22 and H-1 programmes over the years.”
Textron’s latest timeline for FLRAA aligns with the schedule previously outlined by the army, which predicted the first FLRAA flight would come in 2026 followed by LRIP in 2028.
The army plans for initial fielding of the first operational tiltrotor as soon as 2030. That aircraft – previously known as the V280 Valor within Bell – will serve as the army’s aerial troop carrier, ferrying soldiers into battle over vast distances.
Major General Michael McCurry, the army’s top aviation officer, has described FLRAA as a “transformational capability with its speed and reach”.
Army programme requirements for FLRAA stipulated it have range of 2,440nm (4,520km) and continuous cruise speeds of at least 280kt (518km/h).
The tiltrotor was originally billed as a successor to the army’s current utility helicopter – the Sikorsky UH-60M Black Hawk. However, the service’s latest aviation strategy calls for the types to serve simultaneously for three decades or more.
Bell’s tiltrotor design beat out a radical compound coaxial-rotor proposal from Sikorsky to win the FLRAA contest in 2022, with an independent review upholding the army’s selection in 2023.
