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CAST Navigation delivers state of the art GUI in record time
February 2010
Upgraded test and simulation interface exceeds customer expectations. CAST Navigation had another terrific business opportunity. The company had won a contract to test the new avionics system for a sophisticated military aircraft. After 25 years in the GPS/INS test and simulation business, CAST's expertise and equipment for navigation system simulation was perfect for the job with one exception. The software used to demonstrate test results needed to be modernized quickly to meet the new customer's requirements. Ultimately, CAST had three months to produce a state-of-the-art user interface with high-quality graphics that could bring the flight data to life, so the customer could see what was happening during the flight simulation and understand how the navigation system was affected by other objects in the environment. Unfortunately, at the time CAST did not have in-house 3-D graphics expertise and developing the application from scratch could take a man-year or more, not the required 90-day timeframe. Furthermore, GIS tools on the market typically did not display motion or altitude well. Enter STK Engine, AGI's development software that lets users tap into STK's powerful analytical and visualization capabilities and package them in custom applications.
"We chose STK Engine to upgrade our user interface because STK could handle all the required data types out-of-the-box. It also modeled 3D views very impressively, easily produced custom data flows, and, most importantly, could help us deliver our application on schedule," says Bob Addiss, CAST senior software engineer. Using STK Engine, CAST was able to incorporate industry-standard terrain, imagery and GPS YUMA almanac files, display 2D and 3D visualizations smoothly, provide orientation information in the 3D display, and embed STK Engine components into its legacy graphical user interface framework. In the process CAST mitigated risks faced by all program managers in the space, defense and intelligence industries. "Using STK drastically decreased our development time and significantly lowered development and testing costs," says Addiss. "It allowed us to deliver the product, which exceeded the customer's expectations, within the 90-day schedule, instead of many man-months." This teamwork with STK also freed CAST engineers to focus on what they do best, provide low-cost, low-risk dynamic navigation simulation systems to military and commercial markets. It also fit directly into one of CAST Navigation's vision statements, surpassing customer expectations. "The quality of the eye catching visualizations and smoothness of the interactive visualization was more than our customer expected," says Addiss. As a result, the customer bought more units than originally planned and new business prospects are on the horizon. "Today we have a state-of-the-art user interface with very high-quality graphics that we are beginning to ship on a wide range of projects requiring situational awareness," says Addiss. (You can learn more by downloading Addiss's presentation from the 2009 AGI Users Conference at uc.agi.com.)
CAST Navigation presents the ruggedized Notebook for Maintenance
September 2009
The CAST EMT3500-1 diagnostic tool identifies failures on the flight line without the need to remove the EGI from the aircraft. It is user-friendly field equipment that is easy for flight line personnel to operate.
Its graphical interface minimizes key strokes while CDNU-like inputs and readouts significantly reduce the learning curve.
The ruggedized tough book enclosed design, means that in addition to being vibration, shock, and drop-resistant, they are also resistant to water, dust, and extreme temperatures.
CAST Navigation, LLC Receives 2009 Best of Billerica Award
U.S. Commerce Association Award Plaque Honors the Achievement
June 2009
WASHINGTON D.C., June 8, 2009 - CAST Navigation, LLC has been selected for the 2009 Best of Billerica Award in the Navigation Consultants category by the U.S. Commerce Association (USCA).
The USCA "Best of Local Business" Award Program recognizes outstanding local businesses throughout the country. Each year, the USCA identifies companies that they believe have achieved exceptional marketing success in their local community and business category. These are local companies that enhance the positive image of small business through service to their customers and community.
Various sources of information were gathered and analyzed to choose the winners in each category. The 2009 USCA Award Program focused on quality, not quantity. Winners are determined based on the information gathered both internally by the USCA and data provided by third parties.
About U.S. Commerce Association (USCA)
U.S. Commerce Association (USCA) is a Washington D.C. based organization funded by local businesses operating in towns, large and small, across America. The purpose of USCA is to promote local business through public relations, marketing and advertising.
The USCA was established to recognize the best of local businesses in their community. Our organization works exclusively with local business owners, trade groups, professional associations, chambers of commerce and other business advertising and marketing groups. Our mission is to be an advocate for small and medium size businesses and business entrepreneurs across America.
SOURCE: U.S. Commerce Association
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CAST Enters Commercial Simulator Market
September 2007
CAST GPS simulators that are being used in government and military labs around the world will now be made available to commercial markets. The announcement for CAST's new line of simulators was made at the ION GNSS conference in Fort Worth, TX.
The CAST-SIMCOM line of GPS simulators will share the same quality and flexibility as CAST's more capable systems since they are based on the same digital architecture enabling full control of the GPS signal spectrum.
The simulators are capable of producing modernized GPS civilian signals such as L2C, L5-I, L5-Q, SBAS and M-noise as well as the recently published civilian signals, L1C-I and L1C-Q.
"CAST-SIMCOM systems may be used for testing a broad range of applications such as GPS integrated with cell phones, automobiles, ships, commercial aviation and spacecraft, surveying and agricultural tools, golf equipment and more," said Ray Simeon, President of CAST Navigation.
The CAST-SIMCOM simulator is a self-contained, portable system that can be controlled via Ethernet from a Windows PC. It utilizes CAST Windows interface software for remotely controlling simulations.
About CAST Navigation, LLC
CAST Navigation is a leading provider of GPS simulators that supports navigation system research, design, integration and testing at laboratories worldwide. CAST develops hardware-in-the-loop laboratory tools for dynamically testing high fidelity GPS systems. CAST has been addressing navigation challenges for international laboratories for over 25 years.
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CAST President Among 50 Leaders to Watch
May 2006
Ray Simeon, president of CAST Navigation, and other industry leaders have been chosen by GPS World as individuals who will move GNSS industry and technology forward in 2006 and 2007. According to Ray:
| "Next-generation aircraft incorporate multiple tightly-coupled GPS/INS devices as part of their navigation systems. They also use these devices for radar, high resolution optical systems, smart weapons, mission systems, and so on. For simulating this type of environment in the lab, CAST is developing technology that will integrate multiple GPS and inertial navigation system capability into our simulators. The most critical challenge is addressing synchronization issues among all these devices as they would be on the aircraft." |
 |
See article in GPS World
magazine for further details.
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Joint Strike Fighter Chooses CAST Simulator
See Inside GNSS |
GPS World |
Avionics
for more details.
January 2006 - Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company has selected CAST Navigation, LLC to provide GPS/INS simulation systems for their F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF) Mission Systems Integration Lab (MSIL).
The two CAST simulators being supplied will enable the JSF MSIL to emulate ownship motion in the lab for fully evaluating F-35 mission systems and mission critical sensors for substantially augmenting
and reducing instrumented flight testing. The CAST systems will also be utilized to provide aiding in the JSF Vehicle Systems Integration Facility (VSIF).
"CAST is proud to be the only GPS simulator supplier to successfully demonstrate stimulating the JSF Inertial [Navigation System (INS)] while providing coordinated GPS RF to their anti-jam receiver"
said Ray Simeon, president of CAST Navigation.
The CAST system will provide dynamic inertial stimulation for the Honeywell NAV100 INS commensurate with simulated GPS RF for the Raytheon DAR (Digital Anti-Jam Receiver).
CAST is also providing simulation of numerous other navigation sensor models and producing a highly sophisticated jamming environment required by the JSF program.
CAST emerged from the Lockheed Aeronautics competitive selection process as the superior vendor for GPS/INS simulation.
The presence of CAST quality GPS/INS stimulus in their labs will be valuable to all testing activities over the multi-decade lifecycle of the F-35 JSF.
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CAST Selected for Apache Nav System Integration
August 2004
The Army is minimizing AH-64A/D flight testing by utilizing CAST for dynamic ground testing. CAST has equipped them with complete avionics bus messaging for fully interfacing with the EGI nav system.
Simulating flight paths through canyons in jamming fields is critical to their mission. So they enhanced their simulator with CAST's digital terrain masking program to model satellite signal blockage due to the surrounding jammers and area terrain.
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PSI Utilizes CAST for Re-entry Experiment
April 2004
CAST enables PSI to examine navigation performance for their re-entry body (RB) GPS receiver testbed. The following paragraph has been obtained from PSI's website and describes how they are using the CAST simulator.
'Physical Sciences Inc. (PSI) is developing, with Navy SBIR Phase II funding, a hardware in the loop Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver Testbed. A computer simulation will "fly" a re-entry body (RB) along its trajectory and compute plasma properties that produce GPS signal attenuation and pseudo-range changes for each GPS satellite in view for the specified day and time. (The specified day and time determine the locations of the GPS satellites relative to the RB.) The simulation will compose digital instructions that specify GPS signal attenuation and pseudo-range change. The instructions will be sent to a GPS signal simulator via Ethernet using UDP. The GPS signal simulator generates analog RF electronic signals that are fed into a real, physical GPS receiver, thus emulating what would occur on an RB in flight. The GPS receiver navigational output will be compared to the input trajectory to determine the accuracy of the GPS receiver. Because attenuation of the GPS satellite signals will be, in general, different for each satellite, the effect of sequential loss of signal from various GPS satellites and the degradation on GPS trajectory determination will be part of the capability. In addition, when the RB goes into and returns from plasma blackout, the simulation can be continued to determine the time required for the GPS receiver to acquire and establish navigational capability.'
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F-16 Avionics Support at Hill AFB
September 2003
Hill AFB performs organic OFP development support for all the avionics computers on the F-16 Block 30 fighter aircraft. To support this research and development effort, Hill AFB has procured three CAST 3000 simulators.
One simulator is dedicated to the Honeywell EGI navigation system's OFP development. OFP modifications are developed in concert with Honeywell in Clearwater, FL. An EGI is interfaced to the simulator on a test stand and OFP engineers use that test stand to develop their OFP code. The new OFP version is then presented to the Integrated Test Stand (ITS) for test. The ITS is comprised of all the aircraft's avionics with locally developed OFPs executing on them. Note that because Honeywell in Clearwater also has an identical CAST simulator, work between the Air Force and Honeywell can be done in close cooperation on this development effort.
Their second CAST simulator is dedicated to the ITS mentioned above. It provides motion for the EGI on that test stand and this permits an examination of OFP performance during dynamics for all the avionics of the airplane.
Hill AFB's third CAST simulator in that lab is dedicated to the Dynamic Test Stand (DTS). The DTS is an ITS equivalent using software models rather than actual aircraft hardware for the avionics, the exception being the EGI whose Kalman filter algorithms were thought to be too complex to model.
These three simulators have been at Hill for seven years now. There have been many coding errors found in the avionics software during that time due to the availability of dynamics. Savings from early detection of coding errors before flight test is hard to quantify. But a number in the millions of dollars range cumulatively over that period of time is highly probable.
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Testing Tornado Avionics
August 2003
Tornado avionics engineers are responsible for maintaining and testing avionics OFP version upgrades for the program's fighter aircraft. They use CAST simulators in their lab to support this activity. Tornado flight testing is done on an instrumented flight test range on the island of Sardinia. The price quoted for a single hour of Tornado flight test is estimated to exceed 20,000 Euros. They expect to reduce their flight test requirements substantially by performing dynamic ground testing.
In general, the presence of simulation in a lab enables researchers and developers to explore performance and discover problems early in a development process. That is a simple sentence that defines a great deal of financial advantage. In all software development, the earlier that problems are found, the less costly it is to fix them. This reality equates directly to one word. Quality.
Note that often, a contractor is not specifically responsible for flight test costs and perceives there to be less of an imperative to minimize them. This usually proves to be untrue. Flight test requires engineers to be present - and usually the engineers in question are key personnel whose time would be much better utilized at their home lab. Also, when the customer sees their flight test costs increase because of problems that could have been found in a dynamics-capable lab, bad feelings evolve and alternatives are sought.
Flight test requirements will never disappear, but they can be reduced and a great deal of money can be saved by this reduction. Quality tends to derive from that and overall savings result. Facilities that use CAST simulators measure such cumulative savings in millions, not just thousands of dollars.
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EGPWS Integration
June 2001
CAST systems are being used to test a new product, the EGPWS (Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning System). The fusion of data from the GPS/INS system coupled with a GPWS allows for accurate, drift-free navigation to be maintained even with the prolonged absence of one or more sensor inputs. The availability of a CAST simulator in this lab for GPWS confidence testing has permitted accelerated development and transition to flight trials and reduced the number of test flights needed to evaluate performance of the GPS/INS/GPWS integrated system.
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Munitions Testing - Tomahawk
June 2001
CAST systems are dedicated to supporting guidance algorithm development for sea launched Tomahawk cruise missiles. Other systems support guidance algorithm development for guided, five inch shipboard artillery shells.
The cost savings at this facility derive from its responsibility for a gunnery range near the Chesapeake Bay connection of the Potomac River. A live fire experiment requires a great deal of money to be spent clearing the area of watercraft, as well as the airspace above it up to a classified number of thousands of feet. Savings are difficult to quantify, but the number is certainly significant - a result of reducing the number of times this must be done.
For Tomahawk, the test range time required to perform instrumented flight tests is very expensive. This is usually done at sea or on the Nevada test ranges. The presence of CAST simulators in the lab has reduced that requirement.
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Inertial and GPS Advances on GGP
June 1997
Charles Bye and Gary Hartmann presented a paper entitled "Inertial and GPS Technology Advances on the GGP Program" at an ION Annual Meeting in June 1997.
The following paragraph has been obtained from Honeywell Technology Center's website and describes an application where they used the CAST simulator.
Honeywell and its teammates, Allied Signal and Trimble, have developed a design for a compact integrated Global Positioning System/Inertial Navigation System (GPS/INS) under the GPS Guidance Package (GGP) Program funded by DARPA. This effort included developing new inertial sensor technology and implementing inertial aiding of the GPS receiver's tracking loops. The inertial sensors consist of fiber-optic gyroscopes and solid-state silicon accelerometers suitable for a1-nmi/hr-class navigation system. Inertial aiding of the GPS receiver's carrier tracking loop was used to enhance tracking under severe dynamics without compromising anti-jam performance. This paper reviews the hardware and software architecture, packaging approach, and test results from a prototype unit. These tests demonstrated the capabilities of the overall system, including integrated GPS/INS navigation and enhanced performance of the GPS receiver as a result of carrier loop aiding.
The following excerpt is from the paper and describes how the CAST simulator was used for this application.
'GPS/INS test setup- The RMTB (Risk Mitigation Testbed) was tested at Honeywell using a CAST GPST simulator which provided the ability to operate the RMTB over a wide variety of trajectories in a controlled environment. A block diagram of the GPST/RMTB test setup is shown in Figure 11. The inertial data, generated by the GPST, was time synchronized with the RF data from the STEL signal generator using GPST timing signals (i.e., 1 PPS and Simulation Start). The inertial data and RF data were kept synchronized by the 1 kHz timing signal from the GPST. The design of the RMTB and the GGP unit provide the capability to transfer the inertial sensor data into the RMTB in real time over a one MHz serial data bus. The RMTB, which has an internal hard disk, can also store the inertial data locally. The operation of the software in the RMTB is not impacted by the source (preloaded into the RMTB hard disk or in real-time by way of a serial interface) of the inertial data. Therefore, for convenience, the inertial data was stored on the RMTB's hard disk.'
Honeywell continues using CAST simulators for conducting dynamic ground testing for a variety of applications.
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