Sukhoi T-50 PAK FA Continues Air-to-Ground Weapons Integration? Really?

The picture at the link below says something important, but I am perplexed about exactly what that is. No, I am not making fun of the story, I am just confused. The airframe geometry clearly says that stealth is intended to be one of the plane's capabilities, but the discussion of external gravity-bombs as part of the plane's load-out is very confusing. Help me out, somebody...

You've got to get up close and personal with your adversary if you want to drop a gravity-bomb on him. But unless you have done a mighty good job of reducing weapon and pylon radar cross sections, he's going to know you're coming, so the stealthy air frame is not much help. The testing of multiple external-carriage non-stealthy weapons either says that they will have enough stealth assets so that someone else can blow a hole in the Air Defense to make way for this guy, or it says "Whoops... this pig is not as stealthy as we had hoped... Wonder what else these planes can do..."

https://www.ibcworldnews.com/2016/04/14/first-pictures-of-russias-t-50-pak-fa-fighter-fitted-with-air-to-surface-weapons/

B-52 Weapons Integration Tests Outlined

The article at the link below provides a snippet of information on flight test sequencing for weapons systems testing. That makes it worth a peek. But what else it does is show just a bit of the dirty laundry that is laying around the flight test world: the continued question of Developmental vs Operational test. At this late stage you would not expect that the DT guys would still need to wave the flag, but every time a new generation of operators and testers hit the field, some old lessons have to be re-learned. It seems that every new kid says "Why do we need all this DT?" They find out when they try to eliminate it.

http://www.edwards.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123470858

USAF Test Pilot School / Calspan VISTA F-16 With Adaptive Flight Controls?

This test is apparently still in the planning stages, but it shows an important point about testing in today's austere environment. The TPS students are not just learning how to test, they are learning by doing, and are often producing results that are useful to paying customers. Of course, the folks at NASA Armstrong have been demonstrating this kind of system for several years, but this one may have some added potential. We will have to wait until the fall to find out.

http://www.panarmenian.net/eng/news/210156/

Gulfstream G500 Test Progress is Outlined

Not really any breaking news in the story at the link below. (It is really just a press release from General Dynamics.) But it contains a nice summary of testing accomplished to date.

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/gulfstream-g500-and-g600-achieve-program-milestones-300248910.html

Jetpack International Flight Test Offers Lessons

Unfortunately, they are lessons being re-learned. A brief read of the story at the link below shows something of a cavalier approach to flight test after system modifications. "He didn't wear his protective gear because it was just a test flight and he is a great pilot." If that's not on the list of "famous last words" I don't know what is. Come on, guys! If you knew it was going to work properly, you wouldn't need to test it!

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/front-range/denver/jet-pack-test-flight-crashes-pilot-seriously-injured

Volocopter VC200 Performs First Manned Flight

I don't know a lot about the long-term plans for this vehicle, but the implication seems to be that it is working on filling the highly autonomous personal transportation niche. If so, that would explain the odd multi-rotor configuration (a nod to redundancy) and the unusual control inputs (an effort to be intuitive for a "non-pilot" pilot). Have to keep an eye on this one.

Photo: Courtesy Volocopter

http://technabob.com/blog/2016/04/08/volocopter-vc200-manned-flight-test/

Boeing C-17 Undergoes Drag Reduction Testing

The testing discussed at the link below seems very mundane, and it is, but it points out at least two interesting facts regarding military needs and test approaches:
- First, budgets are so tight that a test program designed to save only a few percentage points in the fuel burn of a single aircraft is now worth undertaking. This was not always the case.
- Second, budgets are so tight that the services continue to borrow planes from operational units to do flight testing. This has been going on for a while, and the trend is not going away any time soon, especially for large aircraft.

http://www.amc.af.mil/news/story.asp?id=123471707

Lockheed-Martin F-35C Doing Separation Tests on JSOW

Weapons clearance work on the plane continues. The software has attracted a lot of attention, but software delays are really just an unavoidable fact of life when writing millions of lines of code. The picture at the link below is interesting to me. It seems to show that some work is needed on the amount of charge being placed in the squibs that are firing the ejectors. A pitch attitude like that only milliseconds after ejection says that the weapon may have a lower-than-desired maximum release speed. Reason? At high Q, that kind of pitch will generate enough lift to "fly" the bomb back into the plane, or at the very least, make computed ballistics a challenge.

https://www.dvidshub.net/news/194045/f-35-launches-joint-standoff-weapon#.VwL0vDGJXEY

Solar Impulse is Back in the Air

The story is just a "heads up" on the flight from last week. Sounds like a shake-down before continuing the "round the world" mission. I will keep an eye out for more details.

http://khon2.com/2016/03/31/solar-impulse-2-takes-to-the-skies-again/