Major Upgrade Highlights Unique Acquisition Path For U.S. Army’s FLRAA

The U.S. Army’s next rotorcraft is six years away from entering service, but requirements for the first major upgrade are already being developed.

In the past, the Army’s pursuit of a “Version 2” less than two years after awarding Bell a contract to deliver the baseline version of the Future Long-Range Assault Aircraft (FLRAA) might have raised eyebrows.

• Version 2.0 focuses on sensors and communications
• Requirements are set to be finalized next year

But Army leaders describe the Version 2 plan as a feature of the FLRAA acquisition strategy, not a bug. If the modular, open-systems approach (MOSA) works as advertised, the Army’s next rotorcraft should be far easier and cheaper to upgrade than the Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk fleet that it is replacing.

“This [upgrade strategy] was the whole basis for FLRAA,” Brig. Gen. Cain Baker, the Army director of the Future Vertical Lift Cross-Functional Team, told reporters at an Association of the U.S. Army (AUSA) event in September.

“The architecture inside of that aircraft is [designed in a way] that you could advance it and upgrade it over time without creating major modifications to the platform,” Baker said.

Army aviation officials have launched a process to finalize the Version 2 requirements document. A final draft is expected to be circulated to Futures Command and the Army’s headquarters staff in about a year.

That timeline aligns with a fielding schedule for Version 2 around 2034, the year that the baseline version of the FLRAA was originally scheduled to enter service. In 2019, however, the Army accelerated the FLRAA fielding date to 2031, knowing some advanced capabilities would not be ready.

Familiar with the difficulty and cost that come with the traditional approach to advanced technology upgrades, past Army leaders preferred to extend development schedules as long as necessary to pack as much capability as possible into the baseline version. The Army adopted the MOSA framework on FLRAA to break that cycle.

The baseline FLRAA entered the engineering and manufacturing development phase in August. That milestone came more than a year and a half after the Army eliminated Lockheed Martin’s bid from the competition, citing Lockheed’s lack of responsiveness to the Army’s questions on details of the company’s plan to comply with MOSA requirements.

Following Lockheed’s disqualification, the Army awarded a $1.3 billion contract in November 2022 to Bell to deliver a FLRAA virtual prototype, which is due for delivery by year-end. The first unit equipped of the physical version is expected to follow in 2031. Bell’s design is based on the V-280 Valor, a second-generation tiltrotor.

The speed and range promised by the FLRAA is the key for the Army to realize its vision of future warfare based on penetrating deep into enemy territory, distributing small units to wreak havoc behind enemy lines. The 300-kt.-capable FLRAA is replacing the 170-kt. Black Hawk while offering several times the unrefueled range. But the 2030 version of the FLRAA needs upgrades to make the most of its performance. The aircraft is expected to operate at maximum speed as low over treetops or waves as possible.

The new mission stands in contrast to the standard flight profile flown by Army aviators over the past two decades. Army pilots who are accustomed to flying missions at higher altitudes in order to reduce their vulnerability to short-range, shoulder-fired missiles will be expected to adapt to a new flight regime. The standard Army rotorcraft pilot will need to master the high-speed, low-altitude flight profile generally reserved for the elite special operations community.

To help future FLRAA flight crews make that adjustment to a riskier flight profile, Army officials plan to rely on a suite of upgraded onboard sensors, plus long-range communications systems.

“We’re looking at how you bring on technologies and capabilities to offload pilot requirements into the cockpit,” Baker said, “and how you put an ability to communicate over longer distances.”

A request for information (RFI) published by the FLRAA program manager at the end of last year detailed several specific sensors on the Army’s shopping list.

At the top of the list are sensors capable of detecting wires and obstacles in the FLRAA’s flightpath. The Army also is interested in sensors that can overcome visual problems in bad weather, allowing the crew to see through smoke, dust storms, fog, clouds, snow and rain. A terrain-following and terrain-avoidance sensor—hallmarks of the special operations aviation fleet—also are of interest. And the Army wants a 360-deg. sensor suite that works in all degraded visual conditions.

The FLRAA Version 2 planners also are exploring an improved array of communication systems. The focus is on multi- and single-band software-defined radios with beyond-line-of-sight reach. The package includes high-, very-high- and ultra-high-frequency radios; the ultra-high-frequency ones would be capable of linking to satellites, such as the Navy’s Mobile User Objective System. Battlefield data networks, including Link 16, Tactical Common Data Link and Bandwidth Efficient-Common Data Link, also made the list in the Army’s RFI.

A key focus for the Army are multifunctional systems that package multiple upgrades into the same “box.” If Version 2 requires a unique box—or line replaceable unit—to achieve each new capability, the upgrade could create a new weight and integration challenge for the FLRAA.

“What we don’t want to do between Version 1 and Version 2 is redesign the aircraft,” Baker said.

Army and industry officials have been preparing for this opportunity, along with the unique requirements imposed by a MOSA-based upgrade program. This approach promises to speed up and simplify the integration of new technologies, but only if the standards have been put in place to define the interfaces between the FLRAA flight computer and the new sensors and communication systems.

Anticipating the need for standards, the Army and industry started an architecture collaboration working group a few years ago, Army Program Executive Officer for Aviation Brig. Gen. David Phillips told journalists at the AUSA event.

“That architecture collaboration working group was to help us define those standards and interfaces so it wasn’t just something we came up with separately from industry,” Phillips said. “So they’ve come to the table and helped us define a component specification model for a new system.”

The group aims to eliminate the need for adaptors and middleware, features necessary only in the absence of compatible hardware and software interfaces.

But the MOSA policy changes the traditional relationship between the Army and industry.

“It lowers the bar for competition because now that industry partner comes in with that new capability, and that sensor, for example, is already designed to that standard,” Phillips said. “That is a much faster and affordable integration.”

A lower bar for competition means the supply chain for the FLRAA also must adapt. If it works, the MOSA policy promises to break a vendor’s grip on a subsystem through the life cycle of the platform. That could present unexpected consequences. The same policy that gives the Army freedom to make changes to the FLRAA configuration also denies a long-term revenue stream for suppliers, which was often necessary to justify the upfront investment in the advanced technology in the first place.

“There is a tension there from the older ways of doing business with the newer ways of doing business,” Phillips noted.

If a MOSA policy presents challenges, it also creates opportunities. The approach could incentivize companies to continue investing in upgrades, knowing the path to selection for nonincumbents has become easier.

More than 1,000 representatives of suppliers and other service branches attended a closed Army aviation conference on MOSA during the summer, showing that industry is embracing the concept, he said.

“What we’ve seen is a lot of early adopters and people that really are engaging with us,” Phillips said.