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Aviation History
1998
1998 - 0082.PDF
INDUSTRY NEWS IN BRIEF m NEW SCHIPHOL DATABASE Amsterdam's Schiphol Air port has purchased a new SwITch central flight-infor mation system from Brussels Airport Terminal (BATC) for $2.85 million. BATC markets two versions: Airport Core, an off-the-shelf product for smaller airports, and Core Plus, a more sophisticated system for larger airports. • FIBRE PLACEMENT Alliant Techsystems is to demonstrate manufacture of composite engine-inlet-duct skins for the Lockheed Martin/Boeing F-22 using automated fibre-placement, to reduce production costs, following the success of the process in producing ducts for Lockheed Martin's X-35 Joint Strike Fighter concept- demonstrator aircraft. • BMW R-R FIRST BMW Rolls-Royce has be come the first European en gine manufacturer to be awarded design-organisation approval by the European Joint Aviation Authorities, under Joint Aviation Re quirement QAR) 21. • SEAKR RECORDER SEAKR Engineering of Englewood, Colorado, has received a follow-on contract from the US Air Force Re search Laboratory to develop further its advanced solid- state-recorder technology, using new modular architec ture and fault-tolerant and radiation-tolerant compo nents. Development of a commercially based digital signal-processing board is central to the project. • VR PARACHUTE Systems Technology of Hawthorne, California, has received an order from the US Air Force for its virtual- reality (VR) parachute sys tem, pioneered for training US Forest Service "smoke- jumpers". Boeing picks Meggitt as sole supplier of standby displays IAN SHEPPARD/LONDON MEGGITT Avionics has been selected by Boeing as the sole supplier of solid-state electronic standby instrument systems for the US manufacturer's range of- 7 series aircraft, includingthe Next Generation 737 and the 777. The deal is worth around $15 million a year to the UK company. The contract for the sec ondary flight-display system was signed in December 1997 and will run until 2006. Meggitt fended off bids from its nearest rival BFGoodrich, as well as offers from Smiths Industries and Sextant Avionique. Meggitt Avionics managing director Doug Gemmcll believes that its dominant market position, particularly in the business-aircraft sector, and a technical lead of "around a year", swung the deal in its favour. Boeing's earlier adoption of Meggitt's solid-state clock, deliveries of which start in July, has also helped establish the small UK company's credentials in Seattle. Gemmell says that one unnamed "major world airline" has ordered the unit in an as-yet-unannounced order with Boeing. The first exam ple will be fitted in January 1999, says Gemmell, who is confident Boeing secondary flight display enhances safety that Boeing will make the display "standard fit by 2001", although a contract clause allows some airlines to select competitors' units for con tinuity in retrofit programmes. He says that Airbus is evaluating the unit on an Airbus A321 and is due to make a decision by June. Meggitt Avionics and BF Goodrich are the only two compa nies to certificate and announce sales for their new displays, which replace the three standby instru ments (altimeter, attitude indicator and airspeed indicator) now used. Only the 777 already has three solid-state standby instruments. Both systems can, in addition, dis- plav the cross-hairs of the instrument-landing system, magnetic heading and Mach number. Meggitt's unit was the first to be certificated, in Decem ber 1996, and was awarded US Federal Aviation Ad ministration-type approval on the Cessna Ultra in January 1997. Its second cus tomer was Gulfstream, for its GlVand G\^ followed by the US Air Force for its Lockheed C-141 Starliftercockpit- apgrade programme. Around 150 units have been shipped to Cessna and 30 to Gulfstream. William Gay, BFGoodrich Avionics sales manager, declines to comment on sales figures or num bers shipped of its GH-3000 El ectronic Standby Instrument System (ESIS), certificated in "mid-1997". It is also an option on the GIV and GV and will be stan dard on the Ayres Loadmaster and Bell Boeing 609 civil tilt-rotor. A software update this year will give the BFGoodrich ESIS an interface with aircraft flight-man agement systems, which Meggitt's system will not have, saying that it stopped short with a "...complete get-me-home package with no fid dling around with menus", which it says could confuse pilots. 3 Hughes teams with NASA for ATC programme HUGHES TRMNIXG is to install new control-tower simulation software at NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, California, to help deter mine the potential of new equip ment and processes on air-traffic control (ATC) at some of the USA's busiest airports. Software provided by Hughes Training will be integrated with NASA simulation hardware to sup port radar and out-the-tower visu al simulation over a 360°horizontal field-of-view. Up to 30 major US airports will be covered initially. The system will be used to devel op ways to reduce fuel used by air craft on the ground by developing more efficient taxi routes for air craft and improving gate usage operations. Hughes Training man aging director for ATC simulation, Bob Anderson, says that the system will "....provide increased safety and operational efficiency for the nation's air-traffic-control system, reducing operating costs for air carriers at US airports by hundreds of millions of dollars per year." Tower-simulation studies at Ames will also enable recommend ed procedure and hardware chan ges to be tested and evaluated with in a real-time ATC environment while posing no danger to the trav elling public, says Anderson. Hughes Training will also par ticipate in research studies to enhance the performance, usability and effectiveness of the tower-sim ulation software and will make periodic software updates during die five-year agreement. Hughes Training will deliver its latest version of air-traffic-control tower simulation software to Ames earlv this year. • 28 FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL 14 - 20 January 1998
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