Northrop Grumman [NOC] successfully completed the first flight of the UH-60V Black Hawk helicopter with its partner, the U.S. Army Prototype Integration Facility, the company said Monday.
Northrop Grumman provides the Integrated Avionics Suite of the UH-60V while the prime contractor is Redstone Defense Systems. The helicopter is an upgrade of the Army’s UH-60L helicopters with a digital cockpit, provided by a 2014 contract award.
The new cockpit design is scalable, fully integrated, and open architecture-based, Northrop Grumman said. It replaces analog gauges with digital electronic instrument displays.
The test with the new cockpit occurred on Jan. 18 in Huntsville, Ala. The company highlighted this was the culmination of a cockpit design/development effort finished on schedule and within 29 months of the contract award.
“This UH-60V first flight accomplishment reaffirms our open, safe and secure cockpit solutions that will enable the most advanced capabilities for warfighters,” Ike Song, vice president of mission solutions at Northrop Grumman, said in a statement.
The digital cockpit is also aligned with the Future Airborne Capacity Environment (FACE) standard and supports integration of off-the-shelf hardware and software, the company said. This permits the quick addition of capabilities in several avionics platforms while minimizing cost and risk for system integration and upgrade.
Northrop Grumman said the open architecture approach “provides greater flexibility and enables upgrades to be done with or without the original equipment manufacturer’s involvement.”