Browse Topic: Augmented / virtual reality
Small, highly maneuverable Urban Air Mobility (UAM) air taxis might exhibit motions during hover and low-speed flight that are unfamiliar to many passengers, and for which there are no established guidelines to predict passenger comfort. Researchers performed a study in the Armstrong Virtual Reality Passenger Ride Quality Laboratory to identify relationships between sudden motion characteristics and UAM passenger comfort and acceptance. Twenty-three volunteer test subjects from the Armstrong workforce each completed a 15-minute experience as a passenger in a virtual air taxi simulation. Subjects evaluated a series of flight maneuvers with varying levels of sudden motion using a five-point rating scale and indicated which motion(s) they found uncomfortable. Researchers then administered a post-test questionnaire to relate the passengers’ ratings to their willingness to fly on a real air taxi with similar levels of motion. The study results relate peak heave acceleration and jerk to passenger acceptance.
The complex and turbulent ship airwakes make shipboard rotorcraft launch and recovery difficult for even the most seasoned pilots. One of the main challenges to using flight simulation to train pilots is the real-time accurate prediction of the ship airwake. A real-time, accurate methodology that is able to operate on personal computers without computational meshing is being developed for Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) applications. The early success of this novel approach indicates that it may be well-suited to meet the challenge of dynamic interface (DI) applications as well. To explore this, a novel reduced-order model (ROM) to represent unsteady airwakes for shipboard operations is underway. This ROM will be integrated into an ocean-based representative environment model (REM) to close the gap in real-time simulations without significant computational investment. The ROM effort presented here specifically investigates which superstructure wake characteristics are dominant in different regions where flight operations are conducted. Canonical ship geometries that have been significantly studied experimentally and computationally provide the substantiation of this approach. Evaluation of the accuracy of the approach is presented, correlated with Lattice-Boltzmann simulations, theoretical and experimental data.
This paper investigates the use of multi-modal cueing through full-body haptic feedback to enhance pilot-vehicle system (PVS) performance, reduce mental workload (MWL), and increase situational awareness (SA) in both good and degraded visual environments (GVE/DVE). Piloted simulations were conducted using an H-60-like flight dynamics model in a virtual reality (VR) motion-based simulator, evaluating two ADS-33-like mission task elements (MTEs) – precision hover and slalom – under visual-only and combined visual and haptic feedback conditions in both GVE and DVE. The H-60 flight dynamics were augmented with a dynamic inversion (DI)- based stability augmentation system (SAS), implementing rate-command/attitude hold (RCAH) response type on the roll, pitch, and yaw axes and altitude hold response type on the vertical axis. The SAS was designed to achieve Level 1 handling qualities per ADS-33 standards. The full-body haptic cueing strategy leveraged an outer-loop DI control law, which provided vibrotactile feedback to cue desired roll, pitch, and yaw attitudes to the pilot. Roll cues were delivered via tactors mounted on the upper arms, pitch cues via tactors on the chest and back, and yaw cues via tactors on the calves. Eight test subjects participated in the piloted simulations, including three U.S. Navy test pilots and five subjects with different flying experiences. Results indicated that haptic feedback significantly improved hover performance, reducing MWL and enhancing SA, particularly in DVE. However, in the slalom task, predefined haptic guidance misaligned with pilots’ individual control strategies, leading to performance degradation. This finding highlights the need for pilot-specific adaptive haptic feedback to mitigate inconsistencies in dynamic maneuvering tasks.
ABSTRACT Northrop Grumman has developed a software and hardware solution to provide enhanced 360 degree local situational awareness (LSA) to enable the warfighter with an overmatch capability on today’s modern battlefield. The architecture exploits technological gains in cameras, video processing, and video compression. The approach allows rapid comprehension of local and remote situational views presented with operational relevance for a ground combat platform or tactical wheeled platform crew. The 360 Degree LSA approach provides direct visualization of relative positioning of targets, threats, and lines of fire; and additionally offers common situational understanding / operational picture from the dismounted soldier to higher echelon commands. The approach provides prioritized information through LSA software to provide an enhanced view to the warfighter whereas the squad leader becomes an integral part of the crew with a view of the common operating picture (mounted) and additional sensors on tablet or handheld device (dismounted via wireless). The approach uses a platform agnostic form factor with components that can be selected and applied to legacy or new platforms based on their size, weight, power, and mission constraints.
This paper describes development and testing of a low-cost device mounted on in the pilot seat of a rotorcraft simulator with the aim of improving the perceived realism of the flight. The device acting vertically from the bottom of the seat is used to communicate changes of acceleration in the vertical direction corresponding to heave movement of the simulated aircraft. A bespoke flight simulator system was developed, featuring modular design and virtual reality (VR) visualisation to enable comparative testing with a full motion system. Objective analyses have shown similarities between the two motion cueing configurations when contrasted with only using visual cues.
Refueling mid air is considered as important force multiplier for e.g. conducting search and rescue operations. Due to close proximity to the tanker, the refueling hose and drogue as well as the receiver can be strongly affected by the tanker's wake. Thus, the refueling drogue extended from the tanker by a hose is often oscillating from turbulence. Contact with the tanker has to be established by positioning the receiver's refueling probe within the tanker's drogue. During qualification training pilots are instructed to not focus on the drogue, due to its oscillations. This is done since chasing the drogue often leads to over-controlling and therefore mostly to a failed contact attempt. The presented research aims for improving today's Helicopter Air-to-Air Refueling (HAAR) as well as related training efficiency by a gain of understanding in this phenomenon. Therefore, the HAAR real-time simulation scenario at German Aerospace Center's (DLR) Air Vehicle Simulator (AVES) was extended with a multi body hose and a probe/drogue contact model to enable realistic contact initiation. During a piloted campaign, a total of six pilots with different levels of HAAR experience conducted the maneuver. This paper presents an analysis of obtained eye tracking data with regards to gaze entropy, total fixation duration on defined areas of interest and corresponding time history of control inputs. Potential links between gaze entropy and perceived workload that might be observed in the data are also discussed. Results show that the metrics can highlight differences in successful and unsuccessful attempts for contact of HAAR experienced and inexperienced pilots.
The National Research Council of Canada (NRC) has recently developed an Integrated Reality In-flight Simulator (IRIS) that allows helicopter pilots to fly the NRC's Bell 412 Advanced Systems Research Aircraft (ASRA) while wearing a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) virtual reality headset. IRIS is the first airborne simulator of its kind that combines COTS virtual reality and Fly-By-Wire (FBW) synthetic turbulence for helicopter operations. Simulations are not exact replications of actual environments; therefore, a methodology of comparing pilot workload with respect to an analysis of the differences between the simulated and actual environments is required. During a recent flight trial, NRC validated the effectiveness of IRIS to replicate a pilot's workload during ship landing tasks using these workload scales. During the analysis, NRC took initial steps in developing methodologies to examine environmental characteristics and then correlate them to an associated pilot workload. The work also included the initial development of methodologies to analyze pilot workload and alternative prediction methods that better map subjective or quantitative pilot workload data to DIPES.
Flight mechanics modeling and real-time simulation of rotorcraft have many challenges including the aerodynamics and dynamics of the rotor system, rotor inflow, and wake-airframe interactions. Furthermore, interactional aerodynamic effects are difficult to characterize, in particular during early configuration down-selection. Rotorcraft configurations under consideration for advanced air mobility applications are trending toward designs with coaxial rotor systems and multiple distributed propellers / rotors in close-proximity with one another and the airframe. This proximity leads to strong coupling between the rotor inflow and lifting surfaces (e.g., tiltwing and lift+cruise urban air mobility concepts). This paper describes recent work toward the development of a general-purpose modeling framework for flight mechanics analysis and simulation of rotorcraft and aircraft configurations proposed for advanced air mobility applications. This modeling framework was developed for assessment of aircraft ride qualities during urban flight operations; however, the focus of this paper is on the modeling framework development and application. Model validation with experimental data is another focus, examining scaled model data and flight test results.
Piloted simulation has been used for decades to support flight test activities at the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division located at Naval Air Station Patuxent River, MD. Conventional lab stations at the Manned Flight Simulator facility have been used effectively to support a wide range of flight test requirements. However, there were limitations with these conventional lab stations when the purpose was to assess handling qualities and pilot workload while landing rotorcraft aboard a ship. Two critical simulation elements were determined to be necessary: (1) an expanded field of view so the pilot could see the ship deck below the aircraft and (2) a motion system to provide the pilot with vital proprioceptive cueing in the turbulent ship environment. A new Virtual Reality Lab was developed at Patuxent River that included these key features. The primary components of the lab included virtual reality headsets, an Unreal Engine image generator, ocean and ship visual models, a six degree-of-freedom motion platform, and a generic cockpit. This paper describes development of the lab, various issues that were encountered, and plans for future improvements.
Helicopters are routinely used to transport crew to and from maritime wind farms. Inclement weather situations and demanding tasks put a high workload on pilots during these missions. This paper describes two test campaigns assessing the utility of a low cost Head-mounted display (HMD) to reduce workload for commercial maritime operations. This system was implemented within the Air Vehicle Simulator (AVES) at the German Aerospace Center (DLR). Three tasks were flown with experienced offshore pilots, performed in a realistic scenario. Independent subjective assessments of both workload and situational awareness were obtained. Results from the studies show that the overall workload for all missions decreased when using the HMD. Opinions regarding overall benefit and advantages of the system were found to vary between pilots and missions.
A pilot-in-the-loop simulation environment aimed at increasing pilot visual cues without the need of expensive visualization hardware is presented. The proposed solution relies on Virtual Reality (VR) to enhance the pilot immersion in the simulated environment. The project is integrated in the development of the complete simulation framework FRAME-Sim, focused on simulating rotorcraft in early conceptual design stages, and therefore relying on physics-based multibody simulation of the rotorcraft flight dynamics and free/open source software. FRAME-Sim visual environments that are being used include products available to the market as well as homemade solutions developed to obtain the highest level of versatility during the simulation.
A deep-learning powered single-strained electronic skin sensor can capture human motion from a distance. The single strain sensor placed on the wrist decodes complex five-finger motions in real time with a virtual 3D hand that mirrors the original motions. The deep neural network boosted by rapid situation learning (RSL) ensures stable operation regardless of its position on the surface of the skin.
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