Posted on 11/03/2025 4:43:53 AM PST by Red Badger
The YFQ-44 Fury, Andurll's prototype for the Air Force's collaborative combat aircraft program, made its first flight somewhere in California. Anduril
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The neoprime contractor lagged behind General Atomics for the inaugural CCA flight test.
Anduril’s robot wingman has notched its first flight Friday, more than a month after the neoprime defense contractor blamed software woes and a push to make the inaugural takeoff semi-autonomous for the delay.
The takeoff happened at a testing location in California, the Air Force said in an emailed news release. Anduril’s prototype for the service’s combat collaborative combat aircraft competition has now joined one from General Atomics going from concept to first flight in less than two years.
“This milestone demonstrates how competition drives innovation and accelerates delivery,” said Air Force Secretary Troy Meink in a statement. “These flights are giving us the hard data we need to shape requirements, reduce risk, and ensure the CCA program delivers combat capability on a pace and scale that keeps us ahead of the threat.”
After General Atomics announced their successful first flight in late August, Anduril executives said in September that they wanted to make its first drone wingman flight test semi-autonomous, and blamed the delay on software problems.
Friday’s first flight was semi-autonomous, the company confirmed, and it built the software for the CCA. General Atomics’ drone wingman flight in August was not semi-autonomous.
“YFQ-44A was not designed to be a remotely-piloted aircraft, and that is not how we are operating it — from first flight and forever onward,” an Anduril news release said. “All of our taxi and flight tests have been and will continue to be semi-autonomous. This is a new age of air power; there is no operator with a stick and throttle flying the aircraft behind the scenes.”
General Atomics spokesperson C. Mark Brinkley congratulated Anduril on its milestone.
“This is a really small aviation community, and we all have friends and professional relationships on both sides, so it's good to see their hard work rewarded with success,” Brinkley said. “It's been a great week for the Air Force CCA program. Congratulations all around."
The Air Force’s competitive first increment production design is scheduled to be awarded in 2026.
Last month, Lockheed Martin announced it aimed to fly a CCA candidate of its own by 2027 which may compete in future competitions. Additionally, Boeing announced earlier this month it was designing a tiltrotor drone wingman to support the Army’s helicopter fleet.
“No pilot aircraft controls, no ‘dashboard’, no seats, no oxygen system, no pressurization system, none of those things necessary for a human pilot. Saves a ton of weight and cost. More room for weapons payload.................”
NO ONE CONTROLLING!
Without the vulnerable and delicate human to fly, it can maneuver in flight in ways that would kill a man.......
If I recall, the X 29 is unstable when pilot controlled and is stabilized by fast loops. The result (without pilot) would be more maneuverable than typical configurations. The voting population had better be an odd number with no hanging chads.
We used voting in lithography to deal with defects. Three images, one with a problem could yield a resist image that didn’t print the defect. Took forever.
“Last month, Lockheed Martin announced it aimed to fly a CCA candidate of its own by 2027 which may compete in future competitions.”
two years too late to “compete” with Anduril and General Atomics ...
“Boeing announced earlier this month it was designing a tiltrotor drone wingman to support the Army’s helicopter fleet.”
“designing” ...
“I have no idea what this means “
it means the entire flight plan from takeoff to landing is pre-programmed into the drone and no remote commands are necessary after the drone is told to takeoff ... a combination of terrain recognition and GPS provides position location, and semi-autonomous is probably a reference to the ability to remotely take control if the drone goes astray ...
Palmer Luckey, the Elon Musk of drones, is the genius who owns Anduril ...
The plane was totally unflyable by humans. The necessary response time was about 1/20th of a second.
The voting population had better be an odd number with no hanging chads.
I would have thought so too. But I was told there were four computers that voted on the actuation commands. Maybe if one disagreed they would toss it as a bad actor, so the fourth functioned as a backup to sustain the three?
What to do if two to two?
:)
Yup....until an EMP reprograms the drones computer, or the program code is buggy, and you become the target
What do you bet that somebody ran the statistical probability of two simultaneous errors?
“”EMP””
I believe that is something we WILL experience some day..nothing to look forward to for sure. Can’t remember the series of books about that - I believe Newt Gingrich wrote some with the author - or at least the Forward....
“One Second After”.....William Forstchen
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