Interesting. They're right in that both the ARH and LUH are supposed
to be quickie buys of off-the-shelf aircraft. (We'll see about that.)
Without a small product in-house and ready to go, they were out of the
game.

Sikorsky has done some studies of telescoping tilt rotors -- the blades
slide out to maximum rotor disk diameter for hovering, back in for
cruise. I believe they've also looked at folding tilt rotors that
jacknife back in cruising flight. Both a long ways out, I think.

Hopefully, there is something viable in their design studies. The
X-Wing came to zilch when the government cut off the money. Trouble
is, NASA is no longer funding rotorcraft research, and the military
services still go off in separate directions.


HW