What the FY2027 request buys
Verbatim from the R-2A exhibit for project ACX-01 of PE 0603468E. This is the budget justification's own description of work that has not happened yet — the one thing no other level of the budget carries.
- Continue flight demonstrations validating vehicle release from a host aircraft. - Continue flight demonstrations validating vehicle performance, stability and control through all phases of flight. - Conduct analysis and flight testing to expand flight envelope. - Continue analysis and development of integrated mission systems to mature operationalized capabilities. - Conduct alternate payload integration analysis based on Service-desired concepts of employment. - Initiate alternate aircraft integration studies to include internal and external bomber weapons station integration and safe and acceptable separation computational fluids dynamics analysis. - Continue alternate launch options analysis and risk reduction testing to include palletized and ground launch options. - Conduct propulsion integration studies to explore alternate engine options and engine operability analysis. - Determine manufacturing approaches and design updates required for vehicle production at scale to inform Operational System design and production planning. - Continue maturation of Operational System design based on lessons learned from the Demonstration System, mission systems testing, and manufacturing analysis.
The FY 2027 increase reflects the shift from platform integration and initial demonstrations to flight test operations and follow-on development.
FY2026: the year under way
Prior-year accomplishments and current-year plans from the same exhibit. Context for the FY2027 plan, not a series — an activity partitions its project exactly in the request year, but can under-cover it in earlier years.
- Conduct weapon integration and ground testing. - Complete fabrication and integration of flight test vehicles. - Complete airworthiness certification and host aircraft integration. - Conduct flight testing of the vehicle on a host aircraft. - Conduct flight demonstrations validating vehicle release from a host aircraft. - Conduct flight demonstrations validating air vehicle performance, stability and control through all phases of flight.
Three years, and no five-year plan
An R-2A activity publishes the prior year, the current year and the budget year. The FYDP outyears exist at project and program-element level and are deliberately absent here rather than inferred. Estimate types are colored and never summed into one figure.
| Fiscal Year | Estimate Type | Amount ($M) |
|---|---|---|
| FY2026 | Enacted | 52.7 |
| FY2027 | Request | 151.5 |
This activity is 30% of project ACX-01's FY2027 request and 28% of PE 0603468E's. In the request year the activities under a project sum to it exactly; in the current year they under-cover it in about 9% of cases, so an activity's delta can legitimately exceed its parent's and the two must not be compared row to row.
14 activities in project ACX-01
Every R-2A line of this project, largest FY2027 request first. Linked where the activity has enough of its own narrative to carry a page; the rest are shown in full on the project page.