GE Aircraft Engines researchers for the first time analyzed a dual-spool-cooled turbine in 3-D, succeeding in simulating flow in the high-pressure and low-pressure turbines of the big GE90 commercial turbofan. Using NASA's average passage turbomachinery computational fluid dynamics code, or APNASA, engineers were able to capture multi-stage and component interaction effects, and do so in record time.
The Pentagon's Ballistic Missile Defense Organization and Israel have started preliminary work on what may evolve into a new joint boost phase intercept (BPI) system, Pentagon officials told the Senate Armed Services Committee's strategic forces panel yesterday. The Israelis have an idea for a new BPI program, DOD Acquisition Chief Jacques Gansler told the panel. "It's a concept at this point, worth exploring," he said.
Galloping enginemaker CFM International will slow to a steady racing trot this year after three years of eye-popping new order volume for medium turbofans, CFMI President Gerard Laviec tells reporters here.
BOEING on Tuesday rolled out the first two next-generation 737s manufactured at the increased production rate of 24 airplanes a month. "The new production rate is the highest ever for one commercial airplane model," the company said.
THE WAITING PERIOD for U.S. government review of Eaton Corp.'s proposed acquisition of Aeroquip-Vickers Inc. expired without a request for additional information, Eaton reported yesterday. Eaton plans to acquire Aeroquip-Vickers for about $1.7 billion. The boards of directors of both companies have approved the deal. A meeting at which Aeroquip-Vickers shareholders will vote on the proposal is scheduled for April 8, and the transaction is expected to be completed shortly after the meeting.
SCHLUMBERGER SMART CARDS&TERMINALS will supply satellite payphones for the Globalstar "big-LEO" low-Earth orbit satellite communications network under a contract announced in Cannes, France. Schlumberger, which builds applications for smart card payment technology, will provide Globalstar with smart card payphones for use in remote villages in both outdoor booths and counter-top units that can be installed in stores or other structures.
An apparent write-off at Airbus took a 1,199 million franc ($199 million) bite out of Aerospatiale profits in 1998, the French aerospace company reported. Aerospatiale said that Airbus' contribution to earnings fell from a profit of 1,131 million francs ($187.7 million) in 1997 to a 68 million franc ($11.3 million) loss in 1998 due to a sharp increase in operating provisions - 650 million francs ($107.9 million) more than 1997 - due to customer risks and a 600 million franc ($99.6 million) jump in independently financed research and development.
The U.S. Navy's fleet of T-45 Goshawk trainers at NAS Kingsville, Tex., has logged 200,000 flight hours, Boeing said. The mark was passed on March 5 during a flight by Navy Capt. Scott W. Vance, commander of Training Air Wing Two. Boeing said Vance, who has flown more than 3,800 hours, 355 in the T-45, was on a training flight when he exceeded the 200,000-hour mark. T-45s entered Navy service at Kingsville in 1992. More than 760 aviators have earned their wings in the plane, Boeing said.
NASA managers have decided to mount an early Space Shuttle mission to the Hubble Space Telescope so spacewalking astronauts can replace the telescope's gyroscopes, out of fear that several months of valuable observations will be lost if one of the three gyros still working on Hubble fails.
Boeing Co. demonstrated its Aviation Information Services (AIS) antenna system on a Joint STARS aircraft in a demonstration over Nellis AFB, Nev. AIS received a real-time satellite video feed from a Predator unmanned aerial vehicle, enhancing the Joint STARS' ability to identify, track and target specific ground objects, Boeing said. The demonstration was sponsored by the U.S. Air Force Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Battlelab at Eglin AFB, Fla.
The U.S. Air Force has asked engine manufacturers Pratt&Whitney and General Electric to determine if it can shorten the time frame to field F-16 engine improvements, service leaders told House defense appropriators yesterday. Due to the unusually high number of F-16 crashes over the past year, the Air Force has included funds in its fiscal year 2000 budget to redesign F-16 engine parts. Currently, it will take between 18 and 24 months to get those parts fielded, and there is a desire to do that sooner.
Two Trident II D5 fleet ballistic missiles were launched in a test last month in the Eastern Test Range off the Florida Coast, Lockheed Martin Missiles&Space reported yesterday. It said the two missiles were the 82nd and 83rd consecutive successful test launches of the D5, continuing a string that began in 1989. Last month's test, Lockheed Martin said, was one in a series of evaluations conducted by the Navy to monitor the safety, reliability and performance of the Trident II.
MICROVISION INC., Seattle, has won a contract from the U.S. Army's Aviation Applied Technology Directorate to begin work on design of an advanced helmet-mounted display and imaging system to be used in the Virtual Cockpit Optimization Program (VCOP). Boeing Phantom Works will be Microvision's subcontractor, following a recently announced collaboration between the two companies.
TECSTAR INC., a producer of aircraft support systems and spacecraft solar arrays based in City of Industry, Calif., has been picked to build a test flight rover solar panel for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory for the planned Marie Curie Mars 2001 mission. The Marie Curie rover will use a camera and alpha proton x-ray spectrometer to continue the exploration started by the Mars Pathfinder Sojourner rover in 1997, which was also powered by Tecstar solar cells.
The Pentagon's cost estimates for its major tactical aircraft programs are too low and based on unproven premature savings assumptions, the Congressional Budget Office reported. The Pentagon's estimated total program cost for the Joint Strike Fighter of $85 billion actually will be about $127 billion, Christopher Jehn, assistant director of the CBO national security division, told the Senate Armed Services Committee's Airland Subcommittee yesterday.
TASC INC., Reading, Mass., has won a six-year, $12.5 million contract to provide continued research to support the U.S. Air Force's implementation of an efficient and effective expeditionary force organization. TASC, a subsidiary of Litton Industries, said the contract expands its work with the AF Research Lab.
FlightSafety Boeing Training International, Seattle, reorganized into four business units focusing on specific types of training, FlightSafety reported yesterday. The four units, run by managing directors, are: -- Flight Training, headed by Pat Gaines, which will conduct airline-oriented flight training at all 15 current locations and the regional hubs under development. -- Training Development, under Kevin Higman, which will develop and maintain training curricula, courseware and materials.
Top FAA officials are visiting their counterparts at the International Civil Aviation Organization in Montreal to assure them that the U.S. remains committed to sole-means navigation via satellite despite concerns being raised in Congress and by the General Accounting Office and the Dept. of Transportation's Inspector General. FAA has the support of the Air Transport Association and the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association.
DOT Inspector General Kenneth Mead recommended to a key House subcommittee that FAA defer software decisions on the Standard Terminal Automation Replacement System (STARS) until the military system is completed and that the agency fund a backup for the Global Positioning System (GPS) for the next 15 years because GPS will not be in place until 2015. Mead made the recommendations Tuesday to the House Appropriations transportation subcommittee in a hearing on the $10.1 billion fiscal 2000 FAA budget and on air traffic control modernization.
Lockheed Martin workers in Marietta, Ga., and Palmdale, Calif., approved contracts late Tuesday, averting a possible strike at the facilities, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) reported yesterday. An all-day bargaining session took place Monday among representatives of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service (FMCS), the IAM and Lockheed Martin. The FMCS had canceled a potential strike and ordered the two sides back to the table (DAILY, March 8).
U.S. Air Force computer experts hope to replace a 25-step, three- to four-minute process for creating battle plans with a new process built around voice recognition that should take only six steps and a few seconds.
Boeing and FlightSafety Boeing Training International were selected by the U.S. Air Force to update the training manuals for the VC-25A aircraft, or Air Force One. FSB will update about 3,500 pages of training documents for the aircraft, based at Andrews AFB, Md. After the training document is updated, FSB will provide up to seven weeks of special training for each maintainer assigned to the aircraft.
A distinctive S-shaped structure on the surface of the sun visible in solar x-ray images can help space weather forecasters predict the massive coronal mass ejections (CMEs) that sometimes play havoc with satellites and terrestrial power grids, scientists reported.
