Page 8 - Aerotech News and Review July 1 2016
P. 8
Edwards team creates mobile, reconfigurable cockpit
and throttle, and then monitors and computers
by Kenji Thuloweit gathered from around the IFAST. The makeshift Air Force photograph by Kenji Thuloweit
Edwards AFB, Calif. cockpit fit their desired needs and turned out to
be quite the success for the developers’ purposes. The Portable Manned Interactive Cockpit being built by members of the 772nd Test Squadron
There’s an old saying, “Necessity is the mother However, it wasn’t very mobile. should be completed next month. The innovation team from the 772nd TS are (back left to right)
of invention.” Curtis Westfall, Victor Cruz, Gary Johnson, Kevin Dolber and Orion Westfall (seated).
“It’s wide and doesn’t fit through all the doors.
In flight test, needs are everywhere. Parts, So, we decided on this second iteration we would
scheduling, the need for maintainers; need for make sure it can go on elevators and go through
computers, the need for spectrum to transmit small doorways,”
data, etc.
With the success of the first cockpit, the 412th
The 412th Test Wing at Edwards Air Force TW granted the 772nd TS funds to build the new,
Base, Calif., is also voicing the need for innova- more mobile one. The wing has set aside money
tion to improve the way things are done, not only for innovation projects.
now but for the future.
The new PMIC has a built-in seat that vibrates
At the 772nd Test Squadron a need was identi- to simulate a real cockpit, and built-in stick and
fied, and through some ingenuity and resource- throttle. The stick can be swapped out depending
fulness, the Portable Manned Interactive Cockpit on the type of plane. The sim computers are in-
was conceived. The PMIC was designed and is stalled in travel boxes for easier transport.
being built by a team at the 772nd TS’s Integrated
Facility for Avionics Systems Test. “One thing about the new PMIC is it can be
converted into even a tank or a car if that need
“We’re all software developers and we wanted ever arose,” said Gary Johnson, 772nd TS. “It has
a cockpit that we could use for development that the [gaming] seat, which has the capability of a
wasn’t being used by the [combined test force],” having a center console that can support a steer-
said Orion Westfall, 772nd TS. “We wanted an ing wheel along with a center stick depending on
F-35 cockpit, something small we can do devel- the aircraft.”
opment on.”
The PMIC team plan to use it with other simu-
Westfall said getting time with the actual state- lators where it can join in on missions and also
of-the-art simulators at the IFAST to do software be used for pilot training. Another benefit is the
development can be difficult given how often flexibility of the PMIC to be configured to almost
they’re used. any aircraft type on Edwards. Regular simulators
are only dedicated to one aircraft. The squadron
“We have big full dome simulators, but those also plans to take it out into the community for
rooms are used all the time and we cannot get in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathemat-
there and do any work while a mission is going. ics events.
We’ll schedule the rooms to do work, and if the
CTF decides they want to fly a mission that day, The PMIC is expected to be completed and
then we have to reschedule. It’s kind of important ready to use some time next month.
for them to fly, and we we’re getting rescheduled
a lot.”
The team pieced together a cockpit with a stick
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