Electric tilt-rotor VTOL research testbed built by AgustaWestland revealed yesterday
The radio control model world has been leading the innovation in flying machines for several years now... and some wild and very impressive electric VTOL machines have certainly been a big part of that. But yesterday, March 5, 2013, AgustaWestland revealed that they have built a full-scale flying research demonstrator that incorporates electric motors and tilt rotors, and they did it in relative secrecy in a fashion similar to the Lockheed Skunk Works. Named 'Project Zero', this tilt-rotor was built in just 6 months (apparently back in 2011) with a variety of unmanned flights taking place in 2011 and 2012.
The rotors tilt to allow the aircraft to transition from vertical flight to forward flight using the wings and blended body for lift. The wing panels are also detachable for when operations are intended to be in vertical-only mode, thus increasing the lifting capabilities. I haven't seen any indication yet that Project Zero has made transitional flights (vertical to horizontal), but it's still very exciting to see a design like this being put into actual flying research. The future of advanced aerodynamic design along with electric propulsion (after a few more years of technological breakthrough) is gonna be very exciting! Hopefully more info and details on Project Zero will be made available soon.
Here's the press release info on Project Zero from AgustaWestland:
AgustaWestland, a Finmeccanica Company, today unveiled its “Project Zero” tilt rotor technology demonstrator, giving an insight into what advanced rotorcraft of the future may look like. This, however, is no paper study. The technology demonstrator was designed and built in less than 6 months and has already secretly flown several times in 2011 and 2012, demonstrating AgustaWestland’s advanced rotorcraft technology.
The tilt rotor technology demonstrator is completely electric powered; designed to hover like a helicopter and convert to a fixed wing aircraft in forward flight thanks to its two integrated rotors which can be tilted through more than 90 degrees. The demonstrator performed its first unmanned tethered flight in June 2011 at AgustaWestland’s Cascina Costa facility in Italy and has since performed untethered hovering flights inside a secured area.