Traditional flight test sensing applications require installation of not only the sensor but also supporting cabling and interfacing infrastructure. The cost of this supporting infrastructure increases when it must cross pressure vessel boundaries, extend long distances, or interfere with operation of the aircraft. The continuing cost and schedule pressures on flight test programs demand approaches that minimize installation complexity and reduce the need to modify the aircraft under test. Some emerging approaches have leveraged wireless techniques for data transmission but this can only be used in certain circumstances and does not address the problem of power distribution. This paper describes ongoing research into alternative sensing approaches that utilize a mix of video processing, distributed processing, and power harvesting to provide additional solutions.

The growth of network and distributed technologies in flight test instrumentation (FTI) has provided the benefits of flexibility, scalability, and compatibility with prevalent computing capabilities. However, to achieve these capabilities, the complexity of each piece of FTI and the overall system has increased dramatically. Even with systems composed of equipment from a single vendor, it is important to have management systems that provide the flexibility to adapt quickly to various system configurations and present unified information to the flight test users. The growth of network technologies and then standardized approaches such as iNET standards becoming accepted IRIG 106 standards is leading to the growth of multi-vendor systems. These multi-vendor systems further increase the need for rapidly reconfigurable management systems. This paper describes a constraints engine we have developed to enable flexible system management systems and reflects on how these techniques have been used successfully in the iNET System Manager.

Any redundancy scheme in aircraft control systems is usually considered separately from the control algorithms involved. All feedback control systems are usually designed under the assumption that their sensors will not fail. When the integrity requirements demand it, then a redundancy scheme must be designed to provide any required measurements with only extremely short interruptions to normal service being caused by failures of individual sensors.

The methodology for the design of error-actuated digital set-point tracking controllers proposed by Porter and co-workers has emerged as a result of the pursuit of effective and practical solutions to the problem of designing digital control systems for unknown, dynamically complex multivariable plants with measurable outputs. In this thesis, such digital set-point tracking controllers and the resulting digital set-point tracking systems are enriched to embrace plants with unmeasurable outputs and plants with more outputs than manipulated inputs. In the study of the latter plants, the novel concepts of limit tracking (i.e. the tracking exhibited by plants with more outputs than inputs) is introduced and an associated methodology for the design of self-selecting controllers is proposed. Such controllers involve the selection of different set-point tracking controllers to control the most critical subset of plant outputs based upon the developed rigorous theoretical foundations for the limit-tracking systems. In such foundations, the classification of linear multivariable plants into Class I and Class II plants based upon their steady-state transfer function matrices facilitates the assessment of the feasibility of limit-tracking systems. Furthermore, the associated order-reduction technique simplifies the problem of deciding the minimum numbers of different subsets of plant outputs to be controlled by corresponding set-point tracking controllers. In addition, the dynamical properties of limit-tracking systems are also investigated using the phase-plane method and a methodology for the design of supervisory self-selecting controllers is proposed so as to prevent the occurrence of dynamical peculiarities such as limit-cycle oscillations which might happen in limit-tracking systems. The effectiveness of all the proposed methodologies and techniques is illustrated by examples, and the robustness properties of set-point tracking systems and limit-tracking systems in the face of plant variations and unknown disturbances are tested. Finally, self-selecting controllers are designed for a nonlinear gas-turbine engine and their practical effectiveness is clearly demonstrated.

Human factor issues related to flight deck automation require thorough knowledge of airline pilots’ perceptions of advanced automated aircraft. This understanding is important in designing effective training programmes and developing the standard operating procedures (SOPs) of an airline that are needed to fly these aircraft safely. The purpose of this study was to identify the core components of advanced flight deck automation and to construct a valid and reliable instrument to measure the perceptions of airline pilots with regard to automated flight deck systems on modern commercial jet aircraft. An Automation Attitude Questionnaire, the AAQ, was constructed and distributed to all the pilots employed at a major South African carrier. The subsequent data, received from 262 respondents, was interpreted and then analysed using the SPSS and StatsPac statistical software packages. Exploratory factor analysis indicated that five distinct factors were responsible for a significant portion of the variability in pilots’ perceptions of advanced flight deck automation systems and training on those systems. After analysis, these factors were labelled ‘comprehension’, ‘training’, ‘trust’, ‘workload’ and ‘design’. The results indicated that those pilots who operated mainly Airbus-manufactured aircraft types had a statistically significantly more positive perception of the design of the automation system than those of their counterparts who flew mainly Boeing-manufactured aeroplanes. Co-pilots who operated primarily on the company’s long-range aircraft expressed significantly more positive perceptions of advanced flight deck automation training than the line captains dedicated to long-range flying. It was found that captains flying the company’s short-range aircraft also held a more positive perception of automation training than captains operating long-range aircraft. The biographical variables of age, years of flying experience and total flying hours, appeared to be negatively related to both the comprehension and training dimensions of advanced flight deck automation. However, the mere opportunity to fly these advanced automated aircraft seemed to affect pilots’ perceptions of these systems more positively than negatively. Finally, the overall responses of the majority of participants in this study were very positive with regard to the five core factors related to perceptions of advanced flight deck automation. It is suggested that future studies of this nature should incorporate a larger sample consisting of cross-cultural carriers in the global industry. This will confirm the external validity of the present study and support the transfer of findings to other airline pilot populations. / Dissertation (MPhil)--University of Pretoria, 2009. / Human Resource Management / unrestricted

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The ability of the United States Air Force (USAF) to sustain a high level of operational ability and readiness is dependent on the proficiency and expertise of its pilots. Recruitment, education, training, and retention of its pilot force are crucial factors in the USAF's attainment of its operational mission: defense of this nation and its allies. Failure of a student pilot during a training program does not only represent a loss of costly training expenditures to the American public, but often consists of loss of human life, aircraft, and property. This research focused on the Air Force Reserve Officer Training Corps' (AFROTC) selection method for student pilots for the light aircraft training (LATR) program. The LATR program is an intense 16 day flight training program that precedes the Air Force's undergraduate pilot training (UPT) program. The study subjects were 265 AFROTC cadets in the LATR program. A variety of independent variables from each subject's higher education curricular background as well as results of preselection tests, participation in varsity athletics, prior flying experience and gender were evaluated against subsequent performance in LATR. Performance was measured by a quantitative performance score developed by this researcher based on 28 graded training factors as well as overall pass or fail of the LATR program. Study results showed participation in university varsity athletics was very significantly and positively related to performance in the LATR program, followed by prior flying experience and to a very slight degree portions of the Air Force Officers Qualifying Test. Not significantly related to success in the LATR program were independent variables such as grade point average, scholastic aptitude test scores, academic major, gender and the AFROTC selection and ranking system.

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Wind-shear is a spatial or temporal gradient in wind speed and/or direction, and is generally associated with the presence of cold and warm fronts and thunderstorm cells. It is a serious hazard in the terminal stages of flight for all aircraft but for light aircraft in particular. The research work presented in this dissertation concerns the design of a wind-shear detection system which involved the application of estimation theory and digital simulation techniques. The wind-shear detection system was designed after a careful study of the results obtained from a digital simulation of an aircraft landing phase, including the effects of wind-shear.