The first two prototypes of the Bell/Agusta BA609 civil tiltrotor had covered around 60 percent of the certification flight-test program in more than 350 flight hours and 225 hours of ground running by the middle of last month, in the process reaching the type’s maximum operating altitude of 25,000 feet, its certification speed of 310 ktas and G loadings of +3.1 and -1.0.
The latest in a line of Bell powered- lift designs that stretches back to the XV-3 of 1955, the BA609 has the configuration of a typical general aviation turboprop, with its high wing, T tail, conventional landing gear, 17,000-pound mtow and pair of 1,940-hp PT6C-67A engines, though with a rudderless tail inherited from the Bell Eagle Eye UAV. At 43.6 feet long and 59 feet in span its footprint resembles that of a King Air or S-76, so it should be able to use the same infrastructure. But its most important feature, according to AgustaWestland BA609 project pilot Pietro Venanzi, is the triplex digital fly-by-wire control system.
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