Verification & Validation of a UH-60 FLIGHTLAB® model in support of the UH-60M Limited User Test

In support of the UH-60M Limited User Test (LUT), the Aviation Engineering Directorate (AED) has undertaken the development of a UH-60 FLIGHTLAB® flight dynamics model along with an extensive Verification & Validation (V&V) effort. The purpose of the LUT is to provide a robust representation of the UH-60M production cockpit, coupled with a hardware-in-the-loop testbed, which will allow test and evaluation of the UH-60M day and night crew battle task (Ref. 1). A recovered UH-60 cockpit is being utilized as the Cockpit Test Bed (CTB) and provides an opportunity to use flight hardware in the form of trim actuators, control linkages and sticks to provide a representative feel to the pilots. This paper will describe the development, and subsequent V&V, of the AED UH-60 FLIGHTLAB® flight dynamics model used to stimulate the controls, visual terrain database and cockpit instruments. A very small set of available validation data will be presented. In the process, a consolidated approach to V&V that includes both traditional stability & control and modern frequency domain techniques will be discussed. This paper will also present lessons learned in the quest to match flight test data and how that correlates to pilot satisfaction relative to the simulated flight characteristics.