 Winter 2006 |
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Follow the “Roadmap” Software tracks critical electronic countermeasure systems to help keep military aircraft safe. by Rick Robinson |
WITH UNITED STATES military aircraft facing danger each day, keeping key systems up to date is critical. Engineers from the Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) are using powerful software tools along with engineering and analytical skills to help ensure that the F-16 fighter and other aircraft fly safely.
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Engineers from GTRI’s Electronic Systems Laboratory develop “roadmaps” for the U.S. Air Force – detailed schedules for the maintenance and upgrade of key aircraft systems. In this case, the key systems in question are the electronic countermeasures devices, such as radar-jamming pods, that shield aircraft from enemy attacks.
“GTRI’s method for developing a roadmap is to break a system into components, analyze them, and then document all known deficiencies,” explains project director David Brown. “We look for deficiencies in cost, reliability, obsolescence or capability, and give recommendations on mitigating those deficiencies.”
GTRI has already completed a roadmap for the ALQ-131 and ALQ-184, electronic-countermeasures jamming pods used to protect the A-10 and F-16 aircraft from incoming radar-guided weapons such as missiles.
Brown and fellow research engineer Scott Silence are pursuing work on roadmaps for electronic countermeasure systems on other U.S. military aircraft.
To develop a roadmap, GTRI engineers analyze four areas.
- Sustainability – detailing the repairs, costs and availability of components needed to keep a system combat-ready;
- Threat susceptibility – assessment of the jamming pod’s capability to deal with current threats, pinpointing areas that need improvement;
- Functionality – engineering better functionality into the system, a process guided by customer suggestions, as well as engineering analysis; and
- Intelligence/political issues – assessment of threat proliferation in countries of interest, leading to a time line of needed capability improvements.
Another team of GTRI engineers led by Steve Barton and Richard Fuller analyzes threat susceptibility with a GTRI software tool called SPAM – for Self-Protection Analysis Model – to judge how well the jamming system is doing its job. The SPAM tool gives researchers a wealth of data by simulating interactions between U.S. military aircraft and a radar-directed weapon system.
The researchers look closely at “reduction in lethality” – that is, how well the pod’s electronic countermeasures increase the survivability of the host aircraft.
Though software can identify many issues, eventually an engineer has to take over and decide the most effective way to deal with them.
“Someone has to go through and say: ‘We’re going to have to redesign this system in order to fix that obsolescence problem – and if we’re smart about the way we design it, we can also fix that capability problem at the same time’,” Brown explains.
While software highlights sustainability and threat issues, researchers say that actually talking with the customer is key to functional analysis. This analysis allows the engineers to make the system work more smoothly and effectively.
Roadmap engineers also look at current intelligence to predict when and how countries of interest might upgrade their threat systems. This information is used to devise a time line for getting U.S. systems ready to deal with coming threats.
GTRI’s completed roadmap spells out deficiencies in all four areas and provides recommendations. Such roadmaps offer a multi-year development plan and time line, citing extensive data sources to explain which changes should take priority.
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Last updated: April 29, 2006