Boeing Subsidiary Building Airplane with No Traditional Control Surfaces for U.S. Government

DARPA tapped Aurora Flight Sciences to build the X-65, a full-scale, experimental aircraft design without movable external flight controls.

Jack Daleo

Friday, January 05, 2024 at 05:27 PM ET

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An artist’s rendering of the X-65 design being developed by Aurora Flight Sciences for DARPA and the CRANE project. [Courtesy: DARPA]

Key Takeaways:

DARPA's CRANE program aims to eliminate traditional external aircraft control surfaces (like flaps and rudders) in favor of Active Flow Control (AFC) technology.
Aurora Flight Sciences is building the X-65 demonstrator aircraft, designed with a unique diamond-shaped wing, to test AFC as the primary method for controlling pitch, roll, and yaw by manipulating airflow over the surfaces.
The X-65, an uncrewed demonstrator set for its first flight in summer 2025, will initially use both traditional controls and AFC as a baseline, gradually transitioning to relying solely on AFC for flight control.
This innovative approach is expected to reduce aircraft weight, complexity, and drag, leading to improved performance, and potentially revolutionize both military and commercial aircraft design.

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Since the Wright brothers’ first flight more than a century ago introduced wing warping, almost every aircraft manufactured has included adjustable, external control surfaces: whether they be flaps, slats, spoilers, stabilizers, rudders, elevators, ailerons, or some combination of these.

The Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA), a U.S. Department of Defense unit tasked with developing cutting-edge defense technology, wants to do away with all of them.