Browse Topic: Windows and windshields
This research was initiated with the goal of developing a significantly stronger aircraft transparency design that would reduce transparency failures from bird strikes. The objective of this research is to demonstrate the fact that incorporating high-strength tempered glass into cockpit window constructions for commercial aircraft can produce enhanced safety protection from bird strikes and weight savings. Thermal glass tempering technology was developed that advances the state of the art for high-strength tempered glass, producing 28 to 36% higher tempered strength.As part of this research, glass probability of failure prediction methodology was introduced for determining the performance of transparencies from simulated bird impact loading. Data used in the failure calculation include the total performance strength of highly tempered glass derived from the basic strength of the glass, the temper level, the time duration of the load, and the area under load.A high-strength transparency
In the winter months of January-March 2019, two Bell 525 test aircraft completed cold weather testing at Yellowknife Canada, some 1900 nm from Bell’s Flight Research Center in Arlington, TX. Testing was aimed at demonstrating aircraft stability, performance, and flight characteristics at extreme temperatures as required by CFR Part 29. Since regulations only permit limited temperature extrapolation, the cold temperature tests must include the limit of forward speed in a dive (VNE), and assessments of performance, controllability, autorotation, and static stability. This paper describes some of the unique environmental conditions and factors that any rotorcraft development program could experience in cold weather testing. The paper also gives a technical description of the required testing, where arctic conditions reached as low as -40° F or C (the temperature scales are the same at this temperature). Testing exposed the aircraft to overnight cold-soaks that brought fluids, seals
Harold F. Pitcairn, American aviation and Autogiro pioneer, died from a single gunshot wound to the head in the late evening hours of April 23, 1960 at the age of 62 after a gala evening at which he presided over a celebration attended by more than 450 guests for his brother's Raymond's 75th birthday. Initially labelled a suicide by the press, Pitcairn's widow Clara declared that "she never wanted to hear another word about the tragedy", while friends and friendly local authorities made the argument, duly reported by Frank Kingston Smith in Legacy of Wings, his devotional Pitcairn biography (subsidized by the Pitcairn family), that the death was accidental because "there was no note, no indication of depression or unhappiness" and "the police investigation disclosed that two shots had been fired; one had penetrated the ceiling directly over the desk in the first floor study, another had struck Pitcairn in the eye" and that "the next morning it was discovered the semi-automatic pistol
This work examines the handling qualities (HQ) rating scale from a psychophysical perspective, characterizing workload as the response to a stimulus composed of input to the pilot and pilot outputs. Previous work by the author examining three different display tracking tasks indicated that pilot workload is effectively a logarithmic function of tracking error rate and control rate. This approach, called the Spare Capacity OPerations Estimator (SCOPE), is extended to flight and Handling Qualities data collected (109 runs) for the slalom Mission Task Element (MTE) using the U.S. Army’s JUH-60A RASCAL aircraft. Attitude and Rate Command response types as well as various forcefeel configurations were tested. Based on flight data observation a novel and intuitive action model is proposed for the slalom MTE whereby the pilot operates on the relative angle between the ground track and the upcoming cone’s location (effectively the cone’s location on the windscreen relative to the aircraft nose
ABSTRACT Columbia Helicopters, Inc, (CHI) has procured several military-surplus CH-47D helicopters for use in heavy-lift operations, including fire-fighting and other external lift operations. For decades, CHI has successfully utilized Direct Visual Operational Control (DVOC) to precisely control the load at the end of a long line. The key to DVOC is the use of a bubble window at both pilot and co-pilot positions on the aircraft, which allows the pilot flying the aircraft to see the load directly. CHI designed, manufactured, tested, and qualified a replacement cockpit door to hold a bubble window in the CH-47D. The new doorframe is made of carbon-fiber epoxy composite, holds an 18-inch-deep bubble window in the upper section, and holds a sliding ventilation window in the lower section. An abbreviated composite building block test was completed to prove the structure, and flight test was used to determine the optimal flight attitude to evacuate the cockpit of smoke.
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