DARPA has entered into an agreement with Aurora Flight…

After more than five years of testing models in a wind tunnel, engineers are ready to create the first full-fledged working copy. The problem is that no one understands how it should look and work - this is still an area of ​​experimentation.

It should be immediately clarified that the "X-plane" is a platform for testing various engineering solutions in the field of "air flow control" technology. This is the goal of the CRANE project: to replace the flaps, ailerons and other mechanical systems of aircraft with nozzles from which air is emitted at the right moments. Airplanes now maneuver in the air by small changes in their aerodynamic shape with the help of mechanical devices, but this should be a thing of the past.

The novelty has a lot of advantages and all lie in a military plane. Vehicles created using the new technology will have fewer parts that are difficult to repair, larger hull contours and the ability to take more fuel, will be less visible to radars, they will have higher lift, etc. Alas, all this does not work well even on small models due to the complexity of the technology itself. The US military is well aware of this and therefore insists on creating a full-size model, after testing which it will be possible to make a final decision on the fate of the project.