This upgraded software offers the quick generation of an initial cost estimate at any stage of design in a few simple steps. Used as an analysis tool during part design, DFM Concurrent Costing 1.1 guides product engineers as they investigate alternative materials and processes for producing parts and helps them select the most cost-efficient design. It now allows engineers to import solid models in order to obtain 3D part geometry data for cost estimating. Solid models of parts created in all major CAD/CAM software systems can be opened and viewed.
Engine maker CFM International has signed a memorandum of understanding with Russian aircraft manufacturer Ilyushin to offer the CFM56-5 on the Il-76 transport. According to company officials, CFM plans to provide the entire propulsion package, including engine, nacelle and thrust reverser. Hardware will be based on systems used on the Airbus A340. The MOU specifies a formal program launch only after customers have been found for five of the CFM-powered aircraft. Ilyushin will handle program marketing.
Fort Worth plans to file an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court this week in a last-ditch legal maneuver designed to stop startup Legend Airlines from flying long-haul flights from Dallas' downtown Love Field airport. The appeal comes after the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans upheld a 1998 decision by the Transportation Dept., which essentially sanctions long-distance flights from the airport for aircraft having 56 or fewer seats. Legend is using DC-9s with 56 seats and plans to start scheduled service Feb. 29 (AW&ST Feb. 7, p. 45).
The Douglas-Kalmar TBL-200 aircraft handling tractor is designed for pushback, intergate and higher speed longer distance maintenance towing operations. Cab layout, design concept and modes of operation are the same as the other models in the range, so an operator trained on one of these will be able to work with any other in the series. It is powered by a 93-kw. (125-bhp.) emissions-compliant Deutz water-cooled diesel engine, driving through a conventional ZF power shaft transmission and Kessler axle.
Cornell Dubilier Electronics introduced its new type DSF stacked metallized polyester film capacitor. DSF is fabricated using the stacked metallized film method resulting in a size reduction while providing comparable or greater pulse handling capabilities than the wound method. It is a radial dipped style, with standard voltage rating of 50 volts DC and 100 volts DC Available packaging is bulk, ammo box or reel taping. Cornell Dubilier, 1700 Rte. 23 North, Wayne, N.J. 07470.
Leanna K. Rierson has been named the FAA's national resource specialist for leading-edge aircraft computerization and certification issues. She was the software technical specialist and program manager for the FAA Aircraft Certification Service's Avionics Branch.
Reductions in deployment times and operational tempo as well as hefty bonuses are helping USAF win its pilot retention battle. Based on current trends, the service will face a shortfall of only 600 pilots in Fiscal 2001, compared with the 1,200 originally forecast, according to Air Force Secretary F. Whitten Peters. Additionally, the service will be ``out of trouble'' on the issue several years earlier than anticipated, he said.
Paul Madden, manager of the TRW Aeronautical Systems software engineering facility in Belfast, Northern Ireland, has been appointed chairman of the Northern Ireland Aerospace Consortium.
While Boeing intends to try to win back market share from Airbus Industrie, the company's commercial airplane chief says his group must focus first on ``profitable growth.'' Alan Mulally told Aviation Week&Space Technology that such an approach is only one that will work in the long run for all concerned--customers, employees and Boeing's stockholders.
The Japanese Defense Agency has approved a 55-aircraft purchase in the fiscal year beginning Apr. 1, one fewer than the military services requested and four more than they bought in 1999. While agreeing to spend a mere 0.1% more in fiscal 2000 than currently, the 4.94-trillion-yen ($47-billion) defense budget did not keep pace with general increases of 3.8% in Japan's total national budget of 84.99 trillion yen. The JDA has not released the unit costs of aircraft procurement, but the total for all programs is about $2.4 billion.
GSI Lumonics has added the JK704R laser drilling system to its JK series. It can produce quality, high-aspect ratio holes in a variety of alloys. Patented twin-rod technology provides significant increases in peak and mean power while preserving beam focus quality. A peak power output of 30 kw. provides excellent material removal capability and can be used with pulse shaping to improve the geometrical quality of holes. GSI Lumonics Inc., 4420 Varsity Drive, Ann Arbor, Mich. 48108.
Irish carrier Ryanair will add eight routes to its network this summer and has ambitions to establish a hub in continental Europe in the next few years. Already the largest low-cost airline in Europe, Ryanair is adding flights from its London Stansted hub to Hamburg, Germany; Malmo, Sweden; Nimes and Perpignan, France; and Lamezia and Brescia, Italy. The airline, which recently posted a 20% increase in third-quarter pretax profits, estimates it will carry 7 million passengers in the coming year.
A U.S. national laboratory official has acknowledged that certain space-based research projects are sending a subtle but powerful message to nations considering clandestine nuclear testing: ``You can't hide.''
Michael Lowenson (see photo) has been appointed vice president-finance of the Avtech Corp. of Seattle. He was vice president/chief financial officer of Shannon Ltd., also in Seattle.
Pete Reynolds, Wichita, Kan.-based vice president-flight test for Bombardier Aerospace, has received the 1999 J.H. Doolittle Award from the Society of Experimental Test Pilots. The award recognizes accomplishments in technical management in the fields of aerospace engineering and flight testing. Bombardier experimental test pilot Eric Fiore won the SETP's 1999 Tony LeVier Flight Test Safety Award, which honors an SETP member for contributions to flight safety.
The Assn. of European Airlines' final tally for 1999 showed it to be the worst ever for traffic delays, with records set in every month of the year. Overall, the AEA said 30.3% of flight departures from European airports were delayed by more than 15 min. in 1999 compared to 22.8% in 1998. Airport and air traffic control were cited for more than half the primary delays at 23 out of 27 reporting airports.
Pacelab Cabin is a new knowledge-based engineering tool for the design of cabin interiors from business jets to multiple-deck commercial transports. It largely automates the positioning of cabin interior items while checking and assuring compliance with certification regulations and user needs. The essential functions come within a basic software package allowing standard drawings and reports to be generated at the touch of a button. Corporate exclusivity can be assured by adding separate proprietary modules.
Steve Fossett and two other pilots set an unofficial record for medium-weight aircraft last week flying Fossett's Cessna Citation X business jet around the world in 41 hr., 13 min., 11 sec. Average speed for the 23,071-mi. trip was 559.76 mph. The airplane took off from and landed at Los Angeles International Airport. The crew was accompanied by an observer from the Federation Aeronautique Internationale, which must certify the record. Fossett beat by 6 hr. and 70 mph. the previous mark set in 1988 by Edgar Kaiser who flew a British Aerospace Hawker 800.
Richard R. Wadsworth, Jr., who was senior vice president-finance/chief financial officer for Kitty Hawk Inc., has taken the same posts at Infrastructure Defense Inc., Alexandria, Va.
K. Wolfram Schaefer has been appointed director of business analysis of Worldwide Flight Services Inc. of Fort Worth. He was senior engagement manager at the Frankfurt and Chicago offices of McKinsey&Co.
Faced with the prospect of the E-2C production line closing and with a looming shortage of airborne early warning aircraft, U.S. Navy officials are betting on an improved E-2 to meet their future airborne surveillance needs. Senior Navy officials have drawn up, then revised plans for an E-2C follow-on strategy during the past few years. Included at one point was building the Common Support Aircraft to perform the AEW mission, the C-2's logistics role, the S-3's tanker and antisubmarine warfare role, and the ES-3's intelligence-gathering mission.
Former French test pilot Jacqueline Auriol died in Paris on Feb. 11. She was 82. The noted aviatrix, who flew more than 100 aircraft types, broke world speed records in the 1950s on French-built de Havilland Vampire and Dassault Mystere IV/Mirage III military fighters in a decade-long rivalry with Jacqueline Cochran of the U.S. On Aug. 26, 1956, Auriol became the first woman pilot to fly at Mach 2.
In the wake of a severe, two-year downturn that crippled aircraft sales, business jet manufacturers are optimistic that the resurgence of major Asian economies is reenergizing demand for government and corporate air transportation in the Pacific Rim.
