GE Fanuc Intelligent Platforms Receives $1 M To Equip IAS

Upgrade of UH-1Y Huey helicopter requires rugged COTS solution from reliable long-term equipment provider

(Charlottesville, Va., October 14, 2009) -- GE Fanuc Intelligent Platforms, a unit of GE Enterprise Solutions, today announced that it had secured an order valued at approximately $1 million from Northrop Grumman Inc. of Los Angeles, California. The order is the latest of several similar orders, and is for quantities of GE Fanuc QPMC-1553 1553 PMCs and CEI-830 ARINC boards that will be used by Northrop Grumman to upgrade its Integrated Avionics System (IAS) that is at the heart of the UH-1Y and AH-1Z helicopters.


The GE Fanuc QPMC-1553 PMC and CEI-830 ARINC board are used by the avionics data bus interface, both 1553 & ARINC 429, which is the communications link to the aircraft. They were selected because they represented a COTS (commercial off-the-shelf) solution: they are rugged and conduction cooled, and capable of withstanding the rigors of deployment on a helicopter; and because GE Fanuc was able to commit to availability of an identical solution over an extended time period.

"GE Fanuc's expertise in ruggedization and our experience in supporting critical programs throughout their multi-year lifetime were important to this major military prime contractor," said Peter Cavill, General Manager, Military & Aerospace Products at GE Fanuc Intelligent Platforms. "Avionics is an application where performance, robustness and reliability are prerequisites - not only for the hardware, but for the company that supplies that hardware."

The UH-1Y and AH-1Z, manufactured by Bell Helicopter, are described as a design for the 21st century, produced to meet the stringent requirements of the US Marine Corps today. They bring together common components, a new composite four-bladed rotor system and powerful T700-GE-401C engines. With fully integrated avionics and communications systems the UH-1Y and AH-1Z fly with the most advanced aircraft survivability equipment in the world.

At the outset of the multi-year program, GE Fanuc supplied the QPMC-1553 to Northrop Grumman and has continued to do so. However, a superior replacement is now available which offers improved performance and is form, fit and function compatible with it, offering a highly cost-effective technology insertion opportunity. The QPM-1553 offers a very high level of performance and flexibility for MIL-STD-1553A/B in the PMC form factor, and is integrated with powerful software that reduces development time. All 1553 databus functionality is supported from GE Fanuc's advanced API (Application Programming Interface). Standard features include real-time bus playback (with the ability to edit out RTs), aperiodic message insertion, error injection/detection, conditional BC branching, 45-bit timetags and "Oneshot" BC operation.

The CEI-830 ARINC board provides complete, integrated databus functionality for up to 32 channels of ARINC 429, ARINC 575 and selected 2-wire, 32-bit protocols. It supports maximum data throughput on all 32 channels while providing on-board message scheduling, label filtering, multiple buffering options, time-tagging and error detection with support for either 33 MHz or 66 MHz PCI/PMC interfaces. Also, BusTools/ARINC, GE Fanuc's flexible, Windows(r)-based GUI Bus Analyzer, LabVIEW(tm) and LabVIEW Real-Time support is optionally available. The IRIG-B DC level signal can be utilized to synchronize time stamps across multiple boards.

Source : General Electric