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Announcements |
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11/15/2010
Damage-tolerant Flight Controls Demonstrated
By Graham Warwick
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 Rockwell Collins has demonstrated its
damage-tolerant flight controls can increase
the safety of an in-production unmanned
aircraft, with a series of flights on the
U.S. Army’s AAI RQ-7 Shadow tactical UAV.
The damage-tolerance software was loaded
onto the Shadow’s Rockwell Collins-supplied
Athena flight-control computer and several
flights were conducted to demonstrate safe
recovery and landing after various flight
control and engine failures, including
losing part of the wing.
The flights completed Phase 3 of the U.S.
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s
Damage Tolerance program. Under previous
phases, Rockwell Collins demonstrated safe
recovery and landing of a subscale F-18
model after damage including the inflight
ejection of 60% of the right wing and 30% of
the right horizontal and vertical tails.
In the Shadow trials, the UAV
automatically recovered controlled flight
and landed itself after both neutral and
hard-over failures of ailerons, elevators
and flaps, says David Vos, Rockwell’s
director of control technologies and
unmanned aircraft systems.
The outboard 20 in. of one wing—about 10%
of its span —was blown off in flight and the
UAV automatically recovered and landed, he
says. Simulated engine failures and a
complete shutdown were also conducted, and
the aircraft recovered, selected a landing
site and glided to a safe touchdown, Vos
says.
“We took a production Shadow off the
line, went out with new damage-tolerant
flight-control laws and flew five or six
flights in a few days, with no multi-month
qualification program,” he says. “This was
an important milestone. The next step is how
we make this a standard solution.”
A 2004 study of Shadow accidents showed
50% were caused by failures on the aircraft,
and in 2005 the Army launched a program to
improve the reliability of the UAV’s engine.
With damage-tolerant controls, Vos says,
“When you do have an engine problem, the
aircraft lands itself safely.”
The locations of suitable landing sites
are loaded into the flight-control system
before takeoff. “It always knows where the
nearest safe landing site is, autonomously,
even if you lose link with the aircraft,” he
says.
If the engine fails, the system
automatically selects the best landing site
and plans a trajectory to the runway, Vos
says, continuously calculating wind and
maneuvers such as a spiral descent and
crosswind de-crab before touchdown.
Although Darpa’s Damage Tolerance program
is now complete, Vos says Rockwell Collins
is continuing research into adding
capabilities and functions to its
flight-control software.
Photo credit: U.S. Army |
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8/24/2010
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Rockwell's Radical Flight Controls To Go Operational
Posted by Bill Sweetman on 8/24/2010 |
Rockwell Collins showed
the latest steps in its development of
automatic control systems for UAVs and
manned aircraft at the Association for
Unmanned Vehicle Systems International
show in Denver today - and confirmed
that it has a contract to put its
Automatic Supervisory Adaptive Control (ASAC)
system on an operational UAV.
In 2008, Rockwell demonstrated that ASAC
could recover a scale model of an F/A-18
Hornet after 60 per cent of one wing was
blown off in flight. In more recent
tests unveiled today, the same kind of
model landed safely after losing both
part of the wing and 30 per cent of the
right-hand empennage, and landed -
raggedly but intact - with 80 per cent
of one wing gone. "Even we didn't think
it would fly like that", remarked David
Vos, senior director of Rockwell Collins
Control Technologies.
Vos says that the company is not able to
identify its operational application but
said that "all of you will know it when
you see it, and it is a program of
record." As with the Hornet model tests,
extensive simulation work will be
followed by subscale tests in which
pieces will be removed from the
aircraft.
Rockwell Collins also showed videos of
the model Hornet
performing aerobatics - not a hint
of a future unmanned Blue Angels but a
demonstration of techniques to allow the
aircraft to recover from an upset event.
ASAC has also been used to guide the
aircraft to a dead-stick engine-out
landing.
Survivability of the UAV - an increasing
concern about some military planners,
who worry that a future adversary will
field defenses that render a Predator or
Reaper unusable - is "part of the value
proposition" for ASAC, Vos says. The
ability to recover with major damage
will make the UAV harder and more
expensive to kill. Also, ASAC-type
techniques could allow UAVs to be
designed more simply, with fewer
mechanical back-up systems. |
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click here to watch
the video -
Damage Tolerance Flight Test: 80% wing
loss
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5/1/09
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10/08
BVM-UAV develops wing failure mechanism and assists in vehicle demonstration.
Rockwell Collins Subscale F-18 (Damage Tolerance):
Rockwell Collins
Successfully Controls and Lands
Wing-Damaged UAV
Rockwell
Collins | Jun 11, 2008
Reprinted with permission from
Rockwell Collins.
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CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa: Rockwell Collins,
through newly-acquired Athena Technologies,
has completed a successful flight test of a
significantly damaged unmanned F/A-18
subscale model air vehicle. The Defense
Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA)
sponsored the flight demonstrations held
this spring at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds
in Maryland. During the first flight test,
nearly half of the airplane’s right wing was
ejected to simulate battle damage and
in-flight failure. During the second flight,
almost 60 percent of the airplane’s right
wing was ejected. Upon ejecting the wing
section during both flights, Rockwell
Collins’ Automatic Supervisory Adaptive
Control (ASAC) technology reacted to the
airplane’s new vehicle configuration,
automatically regained baseline performance,
continued to fly the plane, and then
autonomously landed it using internal
Inertial Navigation System/Global
Positioning System (INS/GPS) reference only.
The flight test campaign followed a
similar successful DARPA sponsored
demonstration in April 2007, during which an
aileron was ejected in-flight from the
unmanned subscale F/A-18.
“DARPA asked us to significantly increase
the level of damage and risk in this latest
flight test campaign to really put the
Rockwell Collins controls technology through
its paces,” said Mike Myers, vice president
of Business Development for Rockwell Collins
Government Systems. “We are pleased with the
ability of our adaptive controls to
instantly detect and react to the new
vehicle configuration after loss of major
sections of the wing. The ASAC controls
technology enabled the airplane to continue
to fly completely autonomously without a
hitch and land without further damage.”
Damage tolerance is an enabling
capability for increasing the mission
reliability of UAVs operating in hazardous
and high-threat environments. The technology
provides for real-time autonomous
accommodation of damage, followed by an
adaptation process that alters the flight
control system to compensate for the effects
of the damage. During the flight test,
Rockwell Collins demonstrated a capability
that could be applicable to all military
aircraft operating in combat environments
and to commercial, business and general
aviation for full flight automation and
backup.
“This demonstration highlights the
challenge and importance of autonomously
controlling and landing an airplane that has
sustained catastrophic damage or failure in
flight,” said Dr. David Vos, senior director
of Control Technologies at Rockwell Collins.
“This powerful capability can save the
military the expense of lost UAVs. When
applied to both manned and unmanned
aircraft, damage tolerance is a key
technology that can facilitate the
convergence of manned and unmanned aircraft
in increasingly crowded controlled airspace;
but more importantly, the solution can save
lives.” |
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Please click the link below to see the F-18 in action!
http://www.rockwellcollins.com/news/video/damage-tolerance.html
images\Rockwell Collins\AthenaPreview18Apr2007.wmv
also,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QJkIONTzbNM
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