Future of Electronics In Aviation

Gig 601Xl Builder wrote:
Jim Logajan wrote:
Gig 601Xl Builder wrote:
Jim Logajan wrote:
http://www.darpa.mil/GRANDCHALLENGE/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darpa_grand_challenge
Those aren't for road use.

I'm at a loss as to how to respond to something so fundamentally at
odds with what has already been demonstrated (and prize money
awarded). Or perhaps you meant to suggest something else....

I didn't realize that the 2007 was done in a "Mock-Urbane
Environment." Did they have other cars on the road with real and
automated drivers?

Yes. That is pointed out in the first paragraph of the darpa.mil link I
provided. Looks like I'd better quote the sentence he

"This event was truly groundbreaking as the first time autonomous
vehicles have interacted with both manned and unmanned vehicle traffic in
an urban environment."

And just to be clear, farther down in that page it states:

"Thirty manned traffic vehicles were also released onto the course to
increase traffic density. This fleet of Ford Tauruses were retrofitted
with safety cages, race seats, fire systems, radios and tracking systems,
and were driven by professional drivers. In all, over 50 vehicles, both
manned and unmanned, were navigating the city streets simultaneously
during the final event."

Quoting further:

"...six robots eventually crossed the finish line, an astounding feat for
the teams and proving to the world that autonomous urban driving could
become a reality.

This event was not just a timed race however – robots were also being
judged on their ability to follow California driving rules."

(Not bad progress only 5 years after the challenge was first announced!)

If you get something that is usable in the non-military out of it
great but that isn't the aim of the program.

I don't think you fully understand - the entrants are all self-funded
civilian groups who own any technology they develop - and they only
needed a single American member to qualify, so some were developed in
other countries. Check out the info provided on the teams. The only thing
DARPA is putting up is the prize money. The military motivation is
essentially not relevant once the technology has been proven.

Give it another couple decades or so and I think the next barriers to
seeing AVs on public roads wont be technological, but cultural and legal
barriers.

It is hard to see how these advances would not eventually have some
impact on aviation.

Le Chaud Lapin wrote:


You have shown that, if one wants to make a PAV for $50,000; they will
not be able to use a conventional engine or conventional avionics be
it would be too expensive.

-Le Chaud Lapin-

Then I'll ask you again. What will the engine be?

And I'll agree that there is no reason other than the cost of
certification that the price of avionics can't be lower. Happens already
all the time.

BDS wrote:
wrote

That leaves the airframe at $145k.

Composite airframes are just as expensive.

What are you going to build an airframe out of that significantly reduces
that cost, Chinese rice paper?

Lapin is a babbling idiot.

I wouldn't go that far - he just seems very naive and inexperienced.

There's nothing wrong with dreaming about an aircraft that will use
yet-to-be-invented structural materials, a yet-to-be-invented power source,
yet-to-be-invented controls, yet-to-be-invented lift devices, and
yet-to-be-invented avionics. What seems silly and quite pointless is
arguing about what may or may not be possible 100 years from now and what it
might cost.




Then you aren't reading his posts very closely. He thinks it can be done
with available technology.

On Jun 23, 3:43*pm, Gig 601Xl Builder
wrote:
BDS wrote:
wrote

That leaves the airframe at $145k.

Composite airframes are just as expensive.

What are you going to build an airframe out of that significantly reduces
that cost, Chinese rice paper?

Lapin is a babbling idiot.

I wouldn't go that far - he just seems very naive and inexperienced.

There's nothing wrong with dreaming about an aircraft that will use
yet-to-be-invented structural materials, a yet-to-be-invented power source,
yet-to-be-invented controls, yet-to-be-invented lift devices, and
yet-to-be-invented avionics. *What seems silly and quite pointless is
arguing about what may or may not be possible 100 years from now and what it
might cost.

Then you aren't reading his posts very closely. He thinks it can be done
with available technology.-

I do, with the exception of the lift mechanism and the power source,
which, not suprisingly, influence the rest of the design of the
aircraft more than anything else.

Note: I have no ideas about power source beyond the obvious, though I
would be prediposed to get the entire machine into the electrical
domain as quickly as possible, which makes some options more
preferrable than others.

-Le Chaud Lapin-

In rec.aviation.piloting Le Chaud Lapin wrote:
On Jun 23, 2:55?pm, wrote:


The bottom of the line Cessna 172 costs $235k.

Assume $50k for the engine and controls.

Assume $40k for the avionics.

That leaves the airframe at $145k.

Composite airframes are just as expensive.

What are you going to build an airframe out of that significantly reduces
that cost, Chinese rice paper?

Lapin is a babbling idiot.

You have shown that, if one wants to make a PAV for $50,000; they will
not be able to use a conventional engine or conventional avionics be
it would be too expensive.

You can have VFR avionics for under $10k, so that isn't really an
issue.

All you have to do is magically find a cheap engine that doesn't
exist to power it and cheap materials and assembly processes that don't
exist to build the airframe.

Note that the airframe is by far the most expensive component and
airframe parts and skin can't be made from recycled microprocessors.

If you have a magic wand, it is all trivial.


--
Jim Pennino

Remove .spam.sux to reply.

In rec.aviation.piloting Le Chaud Lapin wrote:
On Jun 23, 3:43?pm, Gig 601Xl Builder
wrote:
BDS wrote:
wrote

That leaves the airframe at $145k.

Composite airframes are just as expensive.

What are you going to build an airframe out of that significantly reduces
that cost, Chinese rice paper?

Lapin is a babbling idiot.

I wouldn't go that far - he just seems very naive and inexperienced.

There's nothing wrong with dreaming about an aircraft that will use
yet-to-be-invented structural materials, a yet-to-be-invented power source,
yet-to-be-invented controls, yet-to-be-invented lift devices, and
yet-to-be-invented avionics. ?What seems silly and quite pointless is
arguing about what may or may not be possible 100 years from now and what it
might cost.

Then you aren't reading his posts very closely. He thinks it can be done
with available technology.-

I do, with the exception of the lift mechanism and the power source,
which, not suprisingly, influence the rest of the design of the
aircraft more than anything else.

Note: I have no ideas about power source beyond the obvious, though I
would be prediposed to get the entire machine into the electrical
domain as quickly as possible, which makes some options more
preferrable than others.

Which does nothing for the airframe cost which is by far the biggest
cost of an airplane.

--
Jim Pennino

Remove .spam.sux to reply.

On Jun 23, 4:35*pm, wrote:
In rec.aviation.piloting Le Chaud Lapin wrote:
You have shown that, if one wants to make a PAV for $50,000; they will
not be able to use a conventional engine or conventional avionics be
it would be too expensive.

You can have VFR avionics for under $10k, so that isn't really an
issue.

I recently read that an upgrade to the G1000 for syntethic terrain was
$10,000. Does this seem right? Just curious.

All you have to do is magically find a cheap engine that doesn't
exist to power it and cheap materials and assembly processes that don't
exist to build the airframe.

Note that the airframe is by far the most expensive component and
airframe parts and skin can't be made from recycled microprocessors.

Thanks.

If you have a magic wand, it is all trivial.

-Le Chaud Lapin-

In rec.aviation.piloting Le Chaud Lapin wrote:
On Jun 23, 4:35?pm, wrote:
In rec.aviation.piloting Le Chaud Lapin wrote:
You have shown that, if one wants to make a PAV for $50,000; they will
not be able to use a conventional engine or conventional avionics be
it would be too expensive.

You can have VFR avionics for under $10k, so that isn't really an
issue.

I recently read that an upgrade to the G1000 for syntethic terrain was
$10,000. Does this seem right? Just curious.

What makes you doubt that price?

When will it get through your thick skull that avionics software, and
especially IFR avionics software isn't cheap?

--
Jim Pennino

Remove .spam.sux to reply.

In rec.aviation.student Le Chaud Lapin wrote:
On Jun 23, 2:02?pm, Michael Ash wrote:
In rec.aviation.student Le Chaud Lapin wrote:

Certainly ?you do not expect the sky to remain off-limits to average
drivers forever. It is very likely, eventually, that something will
have changed to allow them into the sky.

Why not? I expect this. If people ever venture into the sky en masse it
will be in fully automated machines with all of the humans as mere
passengers.

The idea of millions of flying cars being driven around under the control
of average joes is a nice vision but I have no expectation that it will
ever happen.

Small aircraft under human control were, are, and will remain a travel
tool for wealthy people and recreation for the merely well-off.

I wonder if a similar statement was made about automobiles in 1900.

Quite possibly, but so what? Similar statements were probably made about
railroads too, and they would have been 100% correct. It's pointless to
talk about how wrong people might have been about cars, because that has
no bearing on how wrong people might be now about airplanes. To put it
differently, they laughed at Galileo, they laughed at Einstein, but they
also laughed at Bozo the Clown.

What's more, the comparison is completely bogus. In 1900, cars were new
curiosities that nobody really knew much about. In 2008, personal
airplanes have been available for 70+ years, and the airplane itself for
over 100. There is a lot of history and experience in airplane
construction and operation in 2008 that did not exist for cars in 1900.
And it all points toward no "flying cars" of the type where you strap in
behind some controls and fly yourself somewhere.

After all, cars can be dangerous too.

It's not about danger, it's about rates of technological advancement.
Computer technology is advancing much faster than aviation technology, and
there is no reason for this to change anytime in the forseeable future.
The computer technology for an autonomous aircraft will occur (indeed,
already has occurred for aircraft with limited capabilities and
in limited situations) long before the aviation technology for cheap
personal aircraft.

If air travel ever becomes as commonplace as car travel is today, I expect
it to happen with smaller fleets of pooled autonomous aircraft acting as a
sort of taxi service. The aircraft will cost far more than an automobile
does today, but being autonomous they will be easily shared and this
brings the cost per user down to a reasonable level.

But for short ranges I really don't see any reason for air travel to
supplant ground travel, and long ranges are already reasonably handled
with current techniques.

We must remember that there was a time when cars were being used
regularly while parents still took time to teach their children how to
ride horses with the expectation that horse-and-buggy would be the
primary means of travel for the foreseable future.

And most likely that skill came in handy for them, so I don't really see
what your point is.

--
Mike Ash
Radio Free Earth
Broadcasting from our climate-controlled studios deep inside the Moon

wrote:
In rec.aviation.piloting Le Chaud Lapin wrote:
On Jun 23, 4:35?pm, wrote:
In rec.aviation.piloting Le Chaud Lapin wrote:
You have shown that, if one wants to make a PAV for $50,000; they will
not be able to use a conventional engine or conventional avionics be
it would be too expensive.
You can have VFR avionics for under $10k, so that isn't really an
issue.

I recently read that an upgrade to the G1000 for syntethic terrain was
$10,000. Does this seem right? Just curious.

What makes you doubt that price?

When will it get through your thick skull that avionics software, and
especially IFR avionics software isn't cheap?

So why is everyone entertaining this troll?

If lapin wanted to do anything other than
argue in circles, he'd get off his ass and
build a product. No job is too hard for
the man who doesn't have to do it.

Don't feed the trolls.