Breaking News
First flight of Model 437 Vanguard validates Northrop Grumman’s digital ecosystem.
During a recent demonstration, Northrop Grumman integrated its digital ecosystem and advanced production capabilities to construct wings for the Model 437 technology demonstrator, piloted by its subsidiary, Scaled Composites.The d evelopment began within a fully connected digital ecosystem, with Northrop Grumman, client users, and suppliers collaborating to develop, analyze, build, and test the wings before the first flight of Model 437, which took place on August 29, 2024.
Although the Scaled Composites Model 437 technology demonstrator existed as an idea before Northrop Grumman’s Digital Pathfinder project, its first flight on 29 August 2024 has validated the company’s digital ecosystem. (Picture source: Northrop Grumman)
Northrop Grumman's Digital Pathfinder project demonstrates how the company's fully digital engineering ecosystem reduces technical rework, accelerates schedules, and cuts costs, thus providing benefits to customers on future aircraft programs. Drawing on tangible experiences from programs, including the one currently producing the B-21 Raider strategic bomber, the company continues to evolve its collaborative digital ecosystem, which connects the company, its customers, and supplier partners throughout the design, development, and testing phases across a variety of current and future programs.
"We continue to refine these digital tools and capabilities to continually enhance them for future efforts," said Colin Miller, Vice President of Engineering at Northrop Grumman Aeronautics Systems, quoted in a company press release. "This project demonstrates how high-fidelity models within our digital ecosystem serve as a single source of truth to streamline testing and certification of future aircraft, enabling our customer to achieve significant cost and time savings."
The digital ecosystem has reduced technical rework and redesign to less than 1%, compared to 15-20% with traditional methods. The demonstration also leveraged high-fidelity models combined with rigorous and approved model validation schemas to reduce ground and flight testing requirements. Moving forward, these models show the potential to significantly reduce the workload necessary to determine airworthiness, thus offering new possibilities for cost and schedule savings.
Thanks to Digital Pathfinder, Northrop Grumman's high-integrity digital thread has connected engineers, clients, and stakeholders in a virtual environment, allowing them to proactively foresee and address the types of issues that typically affect acquisition programs upfront, thereby significantly improving program performance.
The demonstration also utilized advanced manufacturing techniques, including the production of a titanium structural support via plasma arc energy deposition. The application of this innovative additive manufacturing technique to form a titanium piece is considered a first in the defense industry. At the same time, the Digital Pathfinder project applied advanced techniques to reduce the requirements for hard tooling while improving first-time quality and reducing manufacturing rework.
The Scaled Composites Model 437 technology demonstrator, which existed as an idea before the Northrop Grumman Digital Pathfinder project, began as a conceptual project derived from the previous Model 401, exploring a multi-mission, low-cost, and highly efficient aircraft. Also known as Vanguard, it is a manned variant of the original unmanned Model 437 concept, powered by a single Pratt & Whitney 535 engine with a thrust of approximately 1,542 kg (3,400 lb).
The Vanguard has a wingspan and length of 12.5 m each, with a gross takeoff weight of 4,536 kg. The aircraft is supposed to have a range of about 5,556 km and an endurance of six hours. The aircraft has a payload capacity of 900 kg distributed across several locations, including an internal weapons bay sized to accommodate two advanced medium-range air-to-air missiles AIM-120.