The U.S. Army handed over the first two GE Aerospace-built flight test engines to two vendors working on two Future Attack Reconnaissance Aircraft competitive prototypes on Oct. 20 as part of the Improved Turbine Engine Program, or ITEP.
The two T901 engines will be integrated into the Raider X prototype of Lockheed Martin’s Sikorsky business and into the 360 Invictus offering of Textron’s Bell subsidiary in preparation for aircraft ground runs in the second quarter of fiscal year 2024 and initial flights in the fourth quarter of FY 2024, the Army said Monday.
Preliminary flight rating testing under ITEP is currently underway at the General Electric subsidiary’s facilities.
The T901 engine has an onboard Engine Health Management System to provide predictive logistics capability and features increased power to support the Army’s multidomain operations.
Aside from powering FARA, T901 will replace the T700 engine on UH-60M/V Black Hawk and AH-64E Apache helicopters.