Hasta La Gadget!

Lockheed Martin’s F-35 program has been a political whipping boy seemingly forever, but a production VTOL ‘B’-variant of the pricey supersonic jet finally did what it was made for: a vertical landing. That happened nearly three years to the day after the estimated $304 million (each!) jet’s first mid-air hover test, at which point the Pentagon pegged the cost at $83 million. Inflation aside, the US Marine’s variant seemed to make a fine, if solid three point landing and Lockheed Martin says it’s made considerable strides in the flight testing program over the last couple of years, despite all the overruns and delays. Hopefully that means the US Marines, Britain’s Royal Air Force et. al. will be able to deploy that capability on their F-35B’s soon — ie, before they’re already obsolete. Check the video after the break.

Update: As commenter daveschroeder pointed out, this is the first vertical landing of a production version of the F-35B. Test copies of the fighter (with test pilots aboard) have been performing the feat since late 2011, so we’ve tweaked the article to make that point clear.

Filed under: Misc

Comments

Via: Megazone (Google+)

Source: Lockheed Martin (YouTube)

Europe isn’t quite as firmly on the bleeding edge of UAVs as the US. Northrop Grumman and EADS-run Cassidian just brought the continent one step closer through the first full test flight of Euro Hawk. A new take on the Global Hawk HALE with a new mission system from Cassidian, it should be the continent’s first military UAV that mates both long flight durations with high altitude: the two partners expect Euro Hawk to collect strategic intelligence from up to 60,000 feet and for as long as 30 hours before it needs to touch down. There’s more testing to go before active service begins — the initial flight only lasted eight hours, for example — but the unmanned flyer should eventually keep watch over German troops and territories well past the limits of human endurance.

Continue reading Northrop Grumman, Cassidian run Euro Hawk UAV through its first full test flight (video)

Filed under: Robots, Transportation

Comments

Source: Cassidian

I receive a terse invite from Lockheed Martin that asks me to take a “glimpse into the future,” but it doesn’t mention whose future it is. I could write about what I know of the American defense contractor on the back of a postage stamp, but a cursory Google search fills in some of the blanks. The company reportedly receives around 7 percent of the US military budget on its own – and with that, my imagination runs rampant about what I’m likely to see. Dreaming of playing with laser pistols, intelligent cyborgs and giant robots, I tell them I’m coming.

A few days later, I turn up at the Honourable Artillery Company in London’s glitzy financial district, a miniature castle that’s dwarfed by the gleaming skyscrapers that surround it. In a way, the landscape is telling, since the occupants of those buildings can shoulder some of the blame for the current financial crisis – while across the street, Lockheed Martin is preparing its cost-cutting response.

Two hulking vehicles guard the entrance off a small courtyard, and through a window I see a plush room full of red velvet and leather, stuffed with computers and pensive, well-dressed operators. I wonder if I’m being vetted as I amble inside, my now-sodden socks and matted hair marking me out as unthreatening — just as long as I promise not to get out my camera. As I’m ushered inside and the tour begins, I’m expecting to see jetpacks and robots, but the reality is much different. Not even this industry is immune to the world’s financial problems, and my tour would reveal that its future lies decidedly in our past.

Continue reading What’s Past is Prologue: a look inside the future of Lockheed Martin

Filed under: Robots, Science, Alt

Comments

Forget bombs or the robopocalypse. In our minds, the most fearsome weapon is the one that disables our gadgets. That’s what makes Boeing’s newly tested Counter-electronics High-powered Microwave Advanced Missile Project (CHAMP) scarier than most projectiles. The missile bombards targets underneath with microwaves that shut down computers, power systems and just about anything electrical in their path. Thankfully, CHAMP’s invisible payload arrives in discrete bursts and arguably makes it the world’s most advanced (and likely expensive) non-lethal weapon: the prototype can target multiple individual buildings without ever having to detonate and hurt someone. Boeing is still developing CHAMP in a multi-year program and doesn’t have guarantees that it will become military ordnance, which gives us enough time to accept that saving lives is far, far more important than the risk we’ll have to stop fiddling with our technology.

Continue reading Boeing tests microwave missile that knocks out electronics, represents our worst nightmare (video)

Filed under: Misc

Boeing tests microwave missile that knocks out electronics, represents our worst nightmare (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 23 Oct 2012 22:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink GeekWire  |  Boeing  | Email this | Comments

When we last saw Boston Dynamics’ AlphaDog (aka LS3), it was strutting through outdoor trials with the subtlety of a nuclear missile: for all that noise, it might as well have been holding a “shoot here please” sign broadcasting American soldiers’ positions to everyone in the forest. Several months later, the company is showing both DARPA and the Marine Corps a refined version of its load-carrying robot that has clearly been through a few rounds of obedience school. While we still wouldn’t call the four-legged hauler stealthy, it’s quiet enough to avoid the role of bullet magnet and lets nearby troops chat at reasonable volumes. And yes, there’s new tricks as well. AlphaDog can speed up its travel over difficult surfaces and move at up to a 5MPH jog, all while it’s following a human squad. DARPA and the Marines recently began testing and improving the robot over a two-year period that should culminate in an Advanced Warfighting Experiment with the Marines to test viability under stress. If AlphaDog passes that bar, there’s a good chance many on-foot soldiers will have a mechanical companion — and quite a weight lifted off of their shoulders.

Continue reading Boston Dynamics shows a quieter, more thoroughbred AlphaDog to DARPA and the Marines (video)

Filed under: Robots

Boston Dynamics shows a quieter, more thoroughbred AlphaDog to DARPA and the Marines (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 11 Sep 2012 14:56:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  DARPA  | Email this | Comments