Sikorsky Tests Active Rotor With Flaps

Sikorsky Innovations has completed wind-tunnel testing of an active rotor system equipped with “high-authority” flaps, thus paving the way for improvements in noise, vibration–and, marginally, efficiency–on future rotorcraft.

The program started in 2008 and culminated with the trials, last year, at NASA’s Ames Research Center at Moffett Field in California. It is part of a broader program that encompasses leading-edge rotor blade devices. The tested system involved trailing-edge flaps and a closed-loop control.

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