WEB EXCLUSIVE: Three Stage Process Speeds Path to Avionics System Deployment

There are right and wrong ways to move an avionics system from development to deployment in an effective way. By following a three stage method, engineers can same time and cost.

WAYNE MCGEE, VP AND GENERAL MANAGER CES–NORTH AMERICA

WEB EXCLUSIVE: This article was selected as a special web exclusive preceding its print debut. It will also appear in an upcoming print issue of COTS Journal.

The traditional development process involves three separate stages to get to a deployable system. The first stage gathers the requirements for the system including the deployment environment, functional requirements, performance requirements and CPU headroom. The type of certification (commercial or military), certifying body (FAA, ESA, etc) and level of criticality (Design Assurance Level) are also taken into account. With the completed requirements documents in hand the next step is to build a lab or proof of concept model using as many commercial off the shelf (COTS) as possible to approximate the final system configuration. The examples shown here depict 3u VPX and are applicable to 6u VPX and VNX as well.