Latest Articles by Jonathan Ray

Commercial

Commercial: Aerospace RFID

On the 10 million-square-foot campus of Spirit AeroSystems’ main assembly plant in Wichita, Kan., small, wireless radio-frequency identification (RFID) tags monitor in real time the location of 30,000 aircraft parts during their…

Business & GA

Product Focus: Antennas

New, more powerful satellite constellations are allowing aircraft antenna manufacturers to build smaller but highly capable antennas for narrowbody and corporate aircraft. At the same time, these new antennas also bring with…

ATM Modernization

New Products

ARINC 825 PMC Module TechSAT, of Poing, Germany, in cooperation with Innovative Control Systems, based in Phoenix, Stock Flight Systems and Wetzel Technology released the A825-PMC, described as the first commercially available…

ATM Modernization

Perspectives: Production Variance

As I have read and listened to the discussion of airline profitability and air-traffic control (ATC) problems, punctuated by bankruptcies, delays, congestion, meltdowns, etc., I have concluded the problem, and therefore the…

ATM Modernization

People

Universal Appointments Universal Avionics, Tucson, Ariz., made several management moves, including the appointment of a chief operating officer (COO). Paul DeHerrera (right), who most recently was vice president of marketing and product…

ATM Modernization

Europe’s Green Pursuit

A Scandinavian Airline System (SAS) Boeing 737 descends noiselessly to the threshold of Arlanda Airport at Stockholm, Sweden, having just completed a descent with engines at idle or nearly so. This is…

Military

Teeth of the Growler

Building airborne electronic attack (AEA) capability into the U.S. Navy’s F/A-18F Super Hornet fighter/attack aircraft posed packaging and integration challenges for prime contractor Boeing and AEA subsystem integrator Northrop Grumman. Compared to…

Commercial

Explaining ARINC 818

The ARINC 818 "Avionics Digital Video Bus" standard was released in January 2007. Even before its official release, major programs by both Airbus (A400M military transport) and Boeing (787 Dreamliner) adopted the…