Commercial

Product Focus: Test Equipment For the 'More Electric' Aircraft

The trend toward "more electric" aircraft, with mechanical and hydraulic components' incorporating more and more electronics, has impacted and will continue to significantly affect aircraft manufacturing, operation and maintenance. It has affected…

ATM Modernization

UAV Avionics: Raising the Bar

The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) aims high for the first generation of purpose-built, armed unmanned air vehicles (UAVs). Its Joint Unmanned Combat Air Systems (J-UCAS) program, which unites earlier…

ATM Modernization

A350 Avionics: Combining the A330 and A380

Poised for an expected launch this month, Airbus' A350 will blend new avionics with tried-and-true systems, incorporating features from both its baseline, the enhanced A330-200, and the all-new A380. While not starting…

ATM Modernization

Editor’s Note: Delivering Fuel Savings

Despite a sprinkling of bright spots in the air transport industry--aircraft orders inching up and some U.S. major carriers reporting positive, second quarter financial results--the dark cloud of escalating fuel prices looms…

ATM Modernization

Feedback

Not Invented Here I retired from the FAA as the surveillance team lead in Aircraft Certification's Avionics Systems Branch (AIR-130) in October 2003. As an engineer and former Eastern Air Lines pilot…

Business & GA

The Growing Importance Of IFE Support

European airlines, like others worldwide, recognize how critical fully operational IFE equipment is to customer satisfaction. We learn, however, that various approaches exist to achieving nearly 100 percent systems reliability. The palpable…

Business & GA

Editor's Note: Resolving NFF

In this issue we unearth the challenges of both isolating the root causes and conceiving solutions for no fault found (NFF) (see story), a complex problem affecting operators, maintenance facilities and original…

ATM Modernization

Input/Output: UAVs and the Regulatory Gap

Unmanned air vehicles (UAVs) are a force to be reckoned with--not just by enemy troops. So despite its reservations, FAA is beginning to act. At a UAV event just before the Paris…