Automation is reaching the point that it may be possible for artificial intelligence and robotics to take much of the routine workload of cockpit crews—and “remember” things no humans could in an emergency. Is this the future?
The A&D industry is facing tough challenges with their future workforce, as new generations of workers demand new work environments and collaboration tools. It’s therefore becoming increasingly important for businesses to provide the right collaboration tools and to obtain the right information to shorten their learning curve.
Drone delivery startup Flirtey has begun the first commercial trials of autonomous pizza delivery, flying to customers’ homes from a Domino’s Pizza store in Whangaparaoa, north of Auckland, New Zealand.
The company has formed the Commercial Information Solutions business unit and launched the Quantix, a tailsitting drone that takes off and lands vertically but transitions to wingborne forward flight for increased efficiency and range.
Incentives for airlines to buy biofuels, ways for airports to offset the price and attracting investment are ways the industry hopes to grow to commercial scale.
The most important thing the next president can do for defense policy is revivify the debate over fiscal policy and resolve it before submitting a 2018 budget.
UAS in the news: Flexrotor on ice; Vanilla’s 10-day target; DARPA’s drone hive; Vahana test plans; Flirtey in Silicon Valley; DJI’s Drone SAR app; Airbus bolsters counter-UAS.
GE’s Advanced Turboprop will feature more additively manufactured parts than any previous engine, reducing 855 conventionally made components to just 12 3-D-printed parts.
DARPA program plans to field navigation-grade MEMS IMU by 2020 as a drop-in replacement for today’s tactical-grade sensors to extend the time for which precision weapons can fly without GPS.
From design tools to flexible electronics, advances that proliferate sensing and communications throughout aircraft, engines and the factories where they are made will result in profound design and engineering changes.
Bolstered by the selection of its Silvercrest mid-thrust turbofan for Cessna’s newly launched Hemisphere business jet, Safran Aircraft Engines has detailed a revised development schedule incorporating improvements made to counter problems uncovered in early tests.
Rolls-Royce’s power gearbox and ceramic matrix composites work are part of a plan that will culminate in the UltraFan, an engine aimed at future airliners for 2025 onward.
The concept of printing metallic parts for aerospace applications in place of traditional forging and casting may be in its infancy, but General Electric says the coming revolution in additive manufacturing for aircraft engines is approaching quickly and on an unprecedented scale.
Aviation Week editors recently saw a demonstration of the folding wingtip at Boeing’s plant in Everett, Washington. The target time for extending and/or retracting the wingtip is 20 sec. Watch and listen closely when it reaches the selected position to hear the locking mechanisms engage.
Airbus Group’s Silicon Valley outpost A3 is building a full-size prototype to fly at the end of 2017 and plans a demonstrator to lift an 800-kg payload in 2020.
Uber is ready to take ridesharing into the air, detailing its vision for networks of electric VTOL aircraft providing urban air transport at prices close to ground transportation but at much higher speeds
