Interesting take on the MV-22

[0699]

I was a very small part of the Marine Corps' OT&E team for the V-22. I assisted the Comm/Nav Systems officer (Major Gruber) with troubleshooting some comms issues and coordinating comms with ground forces. I flew on it multiple times in 2000. I was scheduled to be in Arizona for the crash. I knew Maj Gruber pretty well; unfortunately, our last conversation was as close to an arguement as any other conversation we'd had.

I think the V-22 is an impressive airplane. I think, like any new technology, it has issues that need to be sorted out before it's 100%. In the Navy and MC flight communities, every a/c type has what is called the NATOPS Manual. The NATOPS Manuals have notes, cautions, and warnings in them. An old MC aviation saying is that all of the notes, cautions, and warnings are written in blood. I believe many people have forgotten (or don't know) how many died when fixed and rotary wing technology were in their infancy. The V-22 is neither, so there are a lot of new lessons that need to be learned.

The MV22 has some crazy legs though. It's an ideal ship to shore platform which is what it was originally designed for. I'm a big fan. The Marine Corps now has a strong utility platform in the CH-53, a multi use MV22 and the venerable Huey and Cobra combo. Like you said, every aircraft has its pros and cons. For us in the Marine Corps, you can't beat the combat radius of that air craft as a troop and equipment carrier. They are working on ways to give it some teeth which is one of it's other vulnerabilities.

My first deployment to Iraq, it took 3 hours to fly from AA to KV on a 53. My second tour, on the V-22, it took 45 minutes.

Depends if you are just adding "guns" or if you want to put a chin gun, rocket pods, hellfires, etc.
The physical modifications (waist guns for example) are "cheap"
The other options require modifications to the computer software, and the costs go up quickly.

And it isn't a matter of "slaping on a turret/chin gun/rocket pod". There are a lot of flight effects that have to go into the equation. Lots of math and stuff.

 

[busdriver]

Side firing guns on the v-22 are problematic dude to proprotor arc and severe downwash in a hover, unless you're talking side fire like a gunship. The turret thing is terrible thanks to limited field of view of the sensor and quite frankly, it's 7.62 so what's the point? Forward firing ordnance is probably less problematic, but I'm curious about G limits and accelerated stall speeds when pulling out of a diving weapons delivery. The article by McKinney is a great read, I'm curious if they've explored using slight nacelle tilt to augment lift in a tight turn at lower speeds.