Ken Czajka has been appointed vice president-strategic business information systems and Mike Morgal vice president/ general manager of the Systems Engineering Business Unit of the Ascent Logic Corp., San Jose, Calif.
PRATT&WHITNEY HAS SELECTED France's Societe Europeenne de Propulsion (SEP), a Snecma affiliate, to develop and produce a deployable nozzle for the RL10B-2 cryogenic rocket engine scheduled to power the second stage of McDonnell Douglas' Delta 3 launch vehicle (see p. 64). Pratt&Whitney and SEP plan to form a team based at Bordeaux, to finalize the design of the 220-lb., 9.8-ft.-long nozzle. In mid-1995, the companies agreed to develop and produce advanced propulsion systems in Europe and North America.
Roger L. Keller (see photo) has been named president of Hollingsead International Inc., Santa Fe Springs, Calif. He was vice president-marketing and sales of the Honeywell Air Transport Div.
THE UNITED KINGDOM HAS BELATEDLY slid its foot into the door of the Ariane 5 program, committing $4.3 million to the European Space Agency project through the year 2000. The first Ariane 5 mission is scheduled to take place May 15 from Arianespace's launch pad in Kourou, French Guiana. While the move will not bring immediate work, the U.K.'s minimal contribution will allow British companies to be better positioned for future opportunities.
AN INDEPENDENT PANEL is warning NASA that cuts to space shuttle personnel ``might'' impact safety if they are not managed carefully. The Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel, in its annual report to the U.S. space agency, calls for a team approach to restructuring the shuttle program to head off potential morale and safety problems. The report also recommends faster upgrades of navigation equipment by installing triple-string global positioning systems (GPS) on all four shuttle orbiters.
Howmet Refurbishment Inc. expects to win approval to extend its Turbo-Clean process to Pratt&Whitney JT9D fan blades by the end of this month. Company executives say the process for cleaning the serpentine passages in turbine blades is more effective, less expensive and faster than the traditional practice of submerging them in a caustic solution in an autoclave. The Turbo-Clean process already is used on JT8D blades.
CHINA GREAT WALL INDUSTRY CORP. officials say the Feb. 14 accident involving a Long March 3B appears to have been caused by an inertial platform in the guidance system that malfunctioned two seconds into liftoff. But they said their investigation of the mishap will continue. Meanwhile, Comsat Corp. has become the latest casualty in the accident after The News Corp. pulled out of a $100-million deal to lease capacity on the Intelsat 707 satellite that was destroyed when the Long March blew up.
Maintenance, repair and overhaul facilities are being expanded throughout the Asia-Pacific region, despite an overcapacity that has depressed rates and margins. New MRO facilities are being developed in Malaysia, Thailand, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore and China. The Indian market is expected to be the next major target for investment.
Romaxdesigner is an object-oriented design and analysis software package that can be used to concurrently engineer a gearbox using shafts, bearings and gears. Users can manipulate engineering parts containing their own properties and constraints within a friendly, graphical environment. Shaft and bearing systems may be analyzed statically and dynamically, while gears may be designed and rated to AGMA and ISO standards. The package allows engineers to use ``what-if'' scenarios during the design process. The program runs under Windows NT and Windows 3.11.
Coleman Research Corp.'s Hera target system will be used for the first time in a test against the Thaad missile later this month as it takes over the primary role of verifying the performance of this key anti-tactical ballistic missile.
Carl O. Bostrom, former director of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, has received the Capt. Robert Dexter Conrad Award, the U.S. Navy's highest honor for scientific achievement. Bostrom was honored for his contributions to space physics and radar altimetry.
The N1700 is a compact video camera module that achieves 470 horizontal lines of resolution and fast remote control of focus with a 0.25-in. charged coupled device camera and miniature focus drive motor. The package measures 3/8 X 3/4 X 21/4 in. and weighs 11/2 oz. Applications include industrial and machine vision systems, as well as covert operations and surveillance. Options include 2, 4 or 8 mm. focal length lenses, 10 or 49 ft. cables and high-temperature options. EMCO InterTest Inc., 27-1 Ironia Road, Flanders, N.J. 07836-9124.
U.S. AIRLINES GENERALLY reported substantially higher passenger load factors in February as traffic growth continued strong while capacity declined or was held to smaller increases. Continental Airlines had a 65.7% load factor, its highest ever in February, as traffic grew by 6.7% and capacity declined 6.1%. Northwest Airlines reported a 17.2% jump in traffic on an 11.7% increase in capacity systemwide, boosting load factor to 69.1%. Delta Air Lines' traffic was up 10.2% on a 3.3% capacity boost, pushing system load factor up to 65.5%.
Lockheed Martin and Rocketdyne are preparing to test a linear aerospike rocket engine on a NASA SR-71, as part of their bid for the NASA X-33 reusable launcher program. The Rocketdyne engine is mounted at the aft end of a half-model of an X-33 concept, and is shown here being fitted to NASA's SR-71A, tail number 844. The symmetric half-model is the white pod mounted on a reflection plane, which is attached to a wedge-shaped ``canoe'' housing propellants, instrumentation and other rocket systems.
The Model KNCS-N Quick Jaw Change Chuck provides rapid and accurate jaw change in less than 1 min., eliminating reboring and regrinding of existing machined jaws. Quicker changes allow greater productivity in short production runs. The lock and release system delivers a flat grip force that allows higher spindle speeds. Tangential movement of the wedge bars allows self-cleaning of the serration while guarding against accidental jaw release. Autoblok Corp., 285 Egidi Drive, Wheeling, Ill. 60090.
McDonnell Douglas has completed a preliminary design review of the Delta 3 launch vehicle and is moving forward with the company's rapid-paced commercial development program for a more capable two-stage booster scheduled to make its first flight in 1998. The launcher is a derivative of the Delta 2, with a larger payload fairing, new cryogenic upper stage, larger strap-on solid rocket motors and a new first stage fuel tank. The program was kicked off last year with a firm order for 10 from Hughes Space and Communications International.
Excess capacity in the European overhaul-repair industry is expected to erode in the next few years, a trend tied to increasing demand. The long-lasting crisis that impacted the airline industry in the early 1990s produced overcapacity and kept the world fleet's flight time below forecast. In addition, more MRO players are entering the crowded market, including aircraft manufacturers heavily suffering from weak sales and seeking additional noncore business.
R. Frank Leftwich (see photos) has been appointed executive vice president-sales and marketing of Aviall Engine Services. He will continue as president of Aviall Asia Ltd. Charles M. Kienzle has been named senior vice president-operations in the U.S. and Jeffrey J. Murphy senior vice president-law and human resources/secretary/ general counsel.
Investigators from Peru and the U.S. are combing the wreckage and data recorders of a Faucett Airlines 737-200 for clues to the aircraft's crash into a hillside on approach to Arequipa, Peru. The aircraft crashed at 8:15 EST Feb. 29 after a 57-min. flight from Lima, where Faucett is based. Flight 251's destination, Rodriguez Ballon Airport, is 400 naut. mi. southeast of the Peruvian capital.
Karl G. Ronstadt has been named president of the Tucson (Ariz.) Airport Authority. New members of the authority are: Jaime Esteban Gibbons, Arthur L. Gonzales, George W. Miraben, James F. Ronstadt and Sarah R. Simmons. New board members are: Susan G. Boswell, Charles M. Pettis and Billy Joe Varney.
The Targa SCSI Solid-State Flash Disk is available in capacities of 10 megabytes to 1 gigabyte and has no moving parts, eliminating the loss of data due to mechanical failure. It requires no additional software drivers and is system independent. In addition, it incorporates sophisticated automatic error correction/retry capability and fault management to ensure data integrity. The disk is designed to withstand shocks of up to 50g, vibration of 10g at 5-2,000 Hz., operate at up to 50,000 ft. and over a temperature range of -13-167F.
An AGM-130 standoff weapon, guided over 13 naut. mi. solely by enhanced Global Positioning System data, hit a target within 5 meters of the aim point during a recent test. Conducted at Eglin AFB, Fla., on Feb. 24, the flight test confirmed that Wide Area GPS Enhancements (WAGE) can improve the accuracy of weapons now in the U.S. inventory. WAGE relies on five existing ground stations to produce refined satellite position information. GPS accuracy is improved by adding these ``correction bits'' to the end of signals received by users.
