# of Blades Vs Ballistic Tolerance
Ballistic tolerance is another consideration when selecting the number of rotor blades. Increasing the number of blades results in selecting reduced blade cord to retain an optimum solidity ratio. Wide cord blades can be made more ballistically tolerant, thus steering the designers to less blades. This was a prime consideration when going with only four main rotor blades on the Blackhawk and the Apache helicopters. Many arguments took place at Sikorsky in the early stages of the Comanche program. The ballistics group fought for a maximum of 4 main rotor blades while the pilots, performance and dynamics people fought for 5 or more. The latter group won out.