Flight Testing
Following wind tunnel and flight testing by Bell, the aircraft was then moved to NASA Dryden, which is at Edwards AFB in the California High Desert. The XV-15 flight testing continued expanding its flight envelope. It was able to successfully operate in both helicopter and normal aircraft flight modes and smoothly transition between the two. Once the aircraft was considered sufficiently tested, it was returned to Ames for further testing.
The XV-15s were sufficiently tested by 1981 that one of the aircraft was taken to that year's Paris Air Show for demonstration flights.
The XV-15s were a standard demonstration in the annual summer airshow at the co-located Moffett Field Naval Air Station for a number of years in the 1980s. Both XV-15s were flown actively throughout the 1980s testing aerodynamics and tiltrotor applications for civilian and military aircraft types that might follow, including the V-22 program.
Read more about this topic: Bell XV-15
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