Navair

The Naval Air Systems Command, known as Navair, put $4 million into the NASA/Army XV-15 program over the next three years, starting in 1979.

The Dream Machine Richard Whittle 2010

The Naval Air Systems Command, known as Navair, put $4 million into the NASA/Army XV-15 program over the next three years, starting in 1979.

The Dream Machine Richard Whittle 2010

The Naval Air Systems Command, known as Navair, put $4 million into the NASA/Army XV-15 program over the next three years, starting in 1979.

The Dream Machine Richard Whittle 2010

The next day, Navair suspended all Osprey flights pending an investigation.

The Dream Machine Richard Whittle 2010

The outside critic who worried Navair, Bell-Boeing, and the Marine Corps the most, though, was Dunn, for they thought they saw his arguments reflected in questions Undersecretary Aldridge was asking in quarterly meetings on the Osprey and his periodic briefings from Navair.

The Dream Machine Richard Whittle 2010

Eleven days after that debate, Navair gave Bell and Boeing a “letter contract”—precise terms to be settled later—to build four new Osprey prototypes and modify two of those built under the original Full Scale Development contract.

The Dream Machine Richard Whittle 2010

Navair and the companies finished renegotiating the contract on March 19, 1986.

The Dream Machine Richard Whittle 2010

They were mostly Ph.D.s and “graybeards” who had made their careers in rotorcraft research, but the panel also included a couple of test pilots, one of whom had directed the Osprey flight test team at Navair.

The Dream Machine Richard Whittle 2010

Underneath was the white paint Navair required for prototypes.

The Dream Machine Richard Whittle 2010

The HROD tests were continuing, though, because Navair was trying to satisfy Institute for Defense Analyses expert Rex Rivolo that the tests had been adequate.

The Dream Machine Richard Whittle 2010