Pratt&Whitney will sell 12 new F100-PW-229 turbofans to Singapore's air force, along with four spare engines and spare modules, to support the Republic of Singapore Air Force's lease of a dozen F-16C/D fighters, P&W reports this week.
SATCON TECHNOLOGY CORP., Cambridge, Mass., said it received a $75,000 contract from Lockheed Martin to provide component analysis, design and sizing for a hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) version of the U.S. Army's Future Scout Vehicle. Lockheed Martin is the prime contractor for the program, which is the first phase of a project funded by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).
The new U.S. Defense Dept. architecture for satellite communications recommends that military space planners follow trends in the commercial communications satellite industry as they devise DOD satcom networks for the next 15 years, looking to mass-produced platforms and civil frequencies but also studying unmanned aerial vehicles as cost-cutters for some applications.
The U.S. will deploy eight F-117A stealth aircraft to Kuwait, Pentagon officials said yesterday. The move follows the firing of an Iraqi SA-6 missile at two F-16s patrolling the northern no-fly zone.
The U.S. Navy hopes a Russian-developed coating will solve compressor blade erosion problems caused by sand ingestion and plans to conduct a two- year, $1.2 million foreign comparative test program to fully evaluate the technology, Navy project engineer Marcio Duffles tells AP.
Textron's McCauley Propeller Systems unit won supplemental type certification for its BlackMac prop on three six-passenger Piper aircraft models, McCauley says. STCs were issued covering installation of the three-bladed BlackMac, constant speed with an elliptical shaped tip on Piper's Cherokee Six 300, Cherokee Lance and Lance II.
Citing a range of performance and reliability benefits thanks to new technology, Unison Industries executives see a retrofit market of thousands of piston-powered general aviation aircraft for its new magneto ignition system, known as LASAR.
Improved manufacturing processes developed at McDonnell Douglas' Advanced Systems and Technology center in St. Louis - also known as the Phantom Works - are yielding savings in production of aircraft, weapons and spacecraft, and driving changes in concepts of future production, the company said at last week's Farnborough air show. "Although we could utilize most of the new technologies in a major new design, such as the JSF or MD-XX," said Phantom Works VP Jerry Ennis, "we can also take advantage of specific processes in some of the current programs."
PRATT&WHITNEY tapped a former top SNECMA executive, Jean-Louis Berrendonner, to become senior VP heading marketing, sales and service efforts in Europe, Africa and the Middle East. Before joining P&W, Berrendonner was strategic development chief at Intertechnique, an equipment-maker associated with Dassault. He also held a top post at Messier-Bugatti.
Rockwell Collins (U.K.) has made the first sale of a new body-worn computer system intended to replace bulky maintenance manuals and other critical technical publications. The first customer for the system, called Trekker, is Britain's Ministry of Defense, which will conduct a series of tests and evaluations.
The Pentagon plans to deploy a limited cruise missile defense (CMD) as early as 2001-02, according to Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Technology Paul Kaminski. The program must be fully integrated with existing ballistic missile defense programs in a joint service theater air defense architecture, Kaminski says in a three-page report to the Senate Armed Services Committee.
The Air Force's Phillips Laboratory yesterday kicked off a two-day workshop at Kirtland AFB, N.M., to share research information on remote sensing with about 100 scientists and contractors. More than 40 technical papers are slated to be presented, detailing a variety of remote sensing research. Technologies include radar and hyperspectral imagery for gathering imagery from space, sensing methods for space and missile defense and equipment aboard a specialized aircraft for gathering target information and aiming a laser weapon.
Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), Laurel, Md., intends to study invisible air currents, or wake vortices, in tests this month on Runway 33L at Baltimore Washington International Airport. Vortices have been identified as the cause of at least 51 aircraft accidents or incidents in the U.S. from 1983 to 1993. Wake vortices, a byproduct of the lift generated by the airplane's wing, are tornado-like air currents that are particularly hazardous to small planes landing behind large aircraft.
WAKE SHIELD FACILITY has been delivered to Kennedy Space Center for an Oct. 31 reflight aboard the Space Shuttle Columbia. The vacuum epitaxy experiment, which creates an ultra-pure vacuum in the "wake" of a stainless steel disk dropped off in orbit from the Shuttle's robot arm, set a "world record" in semiconductor wafer purity on its last flight (DAILY, Feb. 14).
The Defense Dept. opposes as costly and "unworkable" House language written into the fiscal 1997 defense appropriations bill that would repeal present law permitting the Pentagon to pay restructuring costs in defense industry mergers and acquisitions - but has yet to submit its views in writing, Rep. C.W. (Bill) Young (R-Fla.) said yesterday.
CTA Inc., a Rockville, Md.-based builder of small satellites and advanced information systems, has filed a registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission for the sale of common stock. The company, which specializes in small communications and Earth- sensing platforms, plans an initial public offering of 3 million shares, with another 450,000 shares optioned to the underwriters if necessary.
At least four of the 13 Air Force cruise missiles launched at Iraq on Sept. 3 malfunctioned and didn't proceed to their targets, a Pentagon spokesman said yesterday. Three of the Conventional Air Launched Cruise Missiles couldn't be launched from two B-52H bombers - each was loaded with eight CALCMs - and another failed to ignite after launch and is believed to have fallen into the Persian Gulf, Kenneth Bacon said.
With a general political aim towards NATO membership, most of the East European Visegrad countries - the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and Poland - are linking the post-Cold War reorganization of their armed forces with moves away from Russian military equipment procurement.
The Senate yesterday gave final congressional approval to the $265.6 billion fiscal 1997 defense authorization conference report. The vote was 73-26. The bill now goes to the White House for President Clinton's signature. Clinton said in his weekly radio address on Saturday that he would sign the bill into law even though it's $11.2 billion over his request. The House approved the conference report on Aug. 1.
The U.S. Air Force is considering an advanced technology demonstration (ATD) of a Low-Cost Autonomous Attack System (LOCAAS) that could be launched at targets from a range of 100 miles, an AF official says. "We are currently working on a program we call the LOCAAS ATD" and "we're trying to find funding support for it," said Ken Edwards, the AF LOCAAS program manager. He told The DAILY in a telephone interview from his office at Eglin AFB, Fla., that Air Combat Command is supporting the effort, but that the program plan is still being negotiated.
HONEYWELL SPACE SYSTEMS will build momentum wheels for Space Systems/Loral's next generation of communications satellites, the FS1300 series, under a contract initially set to last three years and be worth $4 million. Honeywell's Satellite Systems Operation in Phoenix, Ariz., will build the reaction wheel assemblies, with first deliveries in June 1997. The contract has options that could take it to $16 million through 2001.
RECON OPTICAL INC., Barrington, Ill., has flown its newest E-O reconnaissance sensor on a T-33 aircraft at Mojave, Calif. The CA-260/25 Mpixel sensor is designed to provide enhanced survivability, higher image quality and increased tactical utility, ROI said. The company said is flying the only operationally deployed E-O framing sensor.
TRW INC. has received a third U.S. patent for its proposed Odyssey medium- Earth orbit satellite cellular telephone system that the company believes will prevent competition at those altitudes. Claims of the latest patent include TRW's system for mobile-phone relays with a MEO platform, and 24- hour coverage over pre-determined latitudes from MEO.
HYUNDAI, INDIAN FIRMS have teamed to provide Globalstar telephone services in India once the 48-satellite constellation begins entering service next year. India's Compton Greaves Ltd. and Pertech Computers Ltd. together will own 51% of the Indian operation, with Globalstar strategic partner Hyundai holding the remainder. The joint venture company, Globalstar India Satellite Service Pvt. Ltd.
COLTEC INDUSTRIES' MENASCO unit has been tapped by Lockheed Martin to supply main and nose landing gear for NASA's X-33 reusable launch vehicle prototype scheduled to fly in 1999 and intended to pave the way for a commercial RLV early in the next century. Menasco will build the shipsets at its Fort Worth, Tex., facility and deliver them to X-33 systems integrator AlliedSignal Aerospace beginning in the first quarter of 1998.
