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We get it the new Sikorsky helicopters use a rigid rotor just the like the X wing they don’t lock because they don’t fly as fast as the X wing and will operate primarily as helicopters.

They also receive about half of their forward momentum from the pusher motor.

The Defiant is the X wing with better trade offs to serve as helicopter rather than a pure VTOL.

I know it might look like nothing but a Kamov but it’s anything but. The Kamov uses flexible contra rotating rotors and is very much a traditional helicopter the new line from Sikorsky is very different.




I worked at Sik and was a rotorcraft engineer for 8 years, master's concentration in fluid mechanics. A stopped rotor with active flow control is a world and era apart from slowed rotor configurations. Almost none of the engineering overlaps, they're completely different approaches except for an end goal of wanting faster forward flight. Similar vs different is semantic at this point. It's like saying the bicycle gave rise to the hovercraft, which is true in a sense.


Ok I’ll concede to your expertise however I still fail to see how the rigid rotors on the S-97/Defiant are not related to the X-Wing at all.




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