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Comment by dralley | Hacker News Reader

* Tiltrotor design, similar in principle to the V-22 Osprey but mechanically much less complicated than the Osprey mechanism, and more stable due to lower disk loading

* Current max speed of 345mph

* Current max range of 2,400 miles

* Capable of unmanned flight

* Helmet allows the pilot to see through the body of the aircraft using AR

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This thing can actually cross the Atlantic hot damn.

> similar in principle to the V-22 Osprey but mechanically much less complicated than the Osprey mechanism, and more stable due to lower disk loading

Being much lighter / less capable than the v22, 30 years younger, and the Navy not being involved, help a lot with everything.

A touch screen? I'd think something tactile would be better. As a driver, I hate my touch screen radio because I have to look at what I'm touching and avoid accidental contact.

Since the introduction in the early 2000s of the so-called "glass cockpit" the current norm is multi-function displays surrounded with "soft buttons" whose functions change depending on the currently-displayed screen. In practice there's not much benefit to this over a touchscreen, since you have to verify the button you're about to press is currently set to the function you want. Since the touchscreen has fewer moving parts, I'd wager the maintenance and production costs are much lower.

Sure, but imagine you're wearing gloves, covered in dirt and mud and oil. I'll take buttons any time over the obsession with touchscreens.

Turbulence too. With a flat surface, there's no way to anchor to a physical point before pressing. With buttons, there's tactile feedback so you can keep your finger on the button through turbulence until you're certain it's the one you want to press.

My experience even in older cars (where bumps more likely affect your control efforts) is that you also need fixed perches near the important controls. Then, you can rest part of your hand on this perch while aiming fingers to the controls.

I think avionics soft buttons are usually arranged this way, and one can imagine similar touch interfaces that would focus on the edges of screens with robust bezels of some kind.

Your body and arm might be shifting around due to the shaking of the cabin. Your hand is stabilized relative to the buttons or knobs near the perch, so you can aim precisely.

What you don't want under shaky situations are controls way out in the middle of a field of controls where you need to aim precisely and have no perch for your hand. Even worse would be the kind of consumer touch UX with drag or other gestures where you could accidentally input some high magnitude command because a cabin movement pushed your free-aiming hand across the screen...

I don't have to imagine, since I have flown these and similar aircraft. It really does not make a difference. I prefer a mechanical cockpit, but the choice between MFDs and touchscreens is not much of a choice. There are so many buttons on MFDs that you don't really operate by feel.

I would agree if the choice were between mechanical cockpits and either of the other two, but that's not the choice at hand, since most Blackhawks were upgraded to MFDs year and years ago, to the point anyone flying in the military today would be nearing retirement if they had much experience in the original cockpits.

The irony here, is that an F35 has a max range of ~1,380 miles by comparison, though obviously an F35 can do in-flight refueling.

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