UNIT V AIRCRAFT DISPLAYS

REF:
Pallet, E.H.J, Aircraft Instruments and Integrated
Systems, Longman Scientific.
 UNIT V AIRCRAFT DISPLAYS

Display technologies
LED, LCD, CRT,
- Flat Panel Display.

Primary Flight parameter displays

- Head Up Display,
Helmet Mounted Display,
Night vision goggles,
Head Down Display,
MFD, MFK, Virtual cockpit
 INTRODUCTION
The most common forms of data display
applied to aircraft instruments are

(a) quantitative

(b) qualitative
 Quantitative
In which the variable quantity being measured is
presented in terms of a numerical value and by the
relative position of a pointer or index.

Qualitative
In which the information is presented in symbolic
or pictorial form.
 Quantitative Displays
There are three principal methods by which
information may bedisplayed:

(i) The circular scale, or more familiarly, the 'clock

type of scale,

(ii) Straight scale, and

(iii) Digital, or counter.

 Quantitative Displays
Circular Scale:
This may be considered as the classical method of
displaying information in quantitative form
Quantitative Displays
 Quantitative Displays
Straight Scale
 Quantitative Displays
Digital Display:
A digital or veeder-counter type of display is one in
which data are presented in the form of letters or
numbers-alpha-numeric display, as it is technically
termed.
 Quantitative Displays
Dual-Indicator Displays:
 Coloured Displays
RED radial line Maximum and minimum limits

YELLOW arc Take-off and precautionary ranges

GREEN arc Normal operating range

RED arc Range in which operation is prohibited

 Qualitative Displays

These are of a special type in which the information is

presented in a symbolic or pictorial form to show
the condition of a system, whether the value of an
output is increasing or decreasing, the movement of a
component and so on.
Qualitative Displays
 Qualitative Displays
The display, shown at (b), is a good example of one
indicating the movement of components; in this case,
flight control surfaces , landing flaps, and air spoilers.
The instrument contains seventeen separate electrical
mechanisms, which on being actuated by transmitters,
position symbolic indicating elements so as to appear
at various angles behind apertures in the main dial
 Head-Up Displays
 Head-Up Displays
In the critical approach and landing phase, a pilot must
transfer his attention more frequently from the
instruments to references outside the aircraft, and
back again;

A transition process which is time-consuming and

fatiguing as a result of constant re-focusing of the
eyes.
 Head-Up Displays

A method of alleviating these problems has

therefore been developed in which vital flight
data are presented at the same level as the
pilot's line-of-sight when viewing external
references, i.e. when he is maintaining a 'head-
up' position.
 Head-Up Displays
The principle of the method is to display the data on
the face of a special cathode-ray tube and to project
them optically as a composite symbolic image on to a
transparent reflector plate, or directly on the
windscreen.

The components of a typical head-up display system

are shown in Fig
 Head-Up Displays
Figure 3.1 3 illustrates the head-up display of a
system known as a Visual Approach Monitor
(VAM).

The system is an airborne equivalent of the

Visual Approach Slope Indicator (VASI) and
was evolved principally as an aid to pilots when
approaching airfields not equipped with VASI,
ILS, or other approach aids.
 HDD-Head Down Display
 HDD-Head Down Display

A display inside the cockpit, usually a radarscope,

(Or) CRT(cathode-tube) raster with a symbology and
ray TV overlay.

It normally is placed below (or)alongside the instrument

panel.
HDD-Head Down Display
 HMD-Helmet Mounted Display
 HMD-Helmet Mounted Display

A helmet-mounted display (HMD) is a device used in

some modern aircraft, especially combat aircraft.

HMDs project information similar to that of head-up

displays (HUD) on an aircrew's visor or reticle, thereby
allowing them to obtain situation
awareness and/or cue weapons systems to the
direction his head is pointing.
HMD-Helmet Mounted Display

Applications which allow cuing of weapon

systems are referred to as helmet-
mounted sight and display (HMSD) or
helmet-mounted sights (HMS).

These devices were created first by

South Africa, then the Soviet Union and
followed by the United States.
 LED DISPLAYS
 There are several ways in which numerical data
can be displayed by means of light-emission,
but the ones which are of interest in this context
are the liquid-crystal display and the light-
emitting diode display.
Liquid-Crystal Display (LCD)
LCD

Most mature flat panel

technology
Major share of FPD market
Poor intrinsic viewing angle
Requires backlight
Inefficient
Slow
Effected by Temperature and
sunlight
Light-Emitting Diode (LED)
Cathode Ray Tubes
 How Does it Compare to Other
Monitors Now?
Advantages: Cheaper on the market now, due
to being established longer
Disadvantages:
Produces x-rays; some are not blocked by lead
shield
Disposal: have to deal with lead; illegal to just
dump in trash
Big, bulky, power hungry (110 watts; compared
to 35 watt LCDs)
Accounts for 80% of electricity use in typical
home computer setup!
 Basic Monitor Interface
The basic interface between any monitor and
the computer, whether CRT or LCD, is
identical. Its just the structure of the display
that differs.

An UXGA adapter takes digital data sent by

application programs, stores it in VRAM or some
equivalent, and converts the data from digital
into analog data for transmission to the
monitor.
 Transmission from PC to
Monitor
The display information is in analog form, so it
is send to the monitor through a VGA cable.

There are many signals, all of these combined

into a composite signal by the VGA cord
What do you already know
about Cathode Ray Tubes?
 Structure of Cathode Ray Tube
Etymology: Cathode rays in a vacuum tube.
Cathode rays are high energy electrons
emitted from the heated cathode (-) of a
vacuum tube
 How Does it Work
Electron gun is weak particle accelerator (only
electrons(-)).
Aims electrons at phosphor screen where they
light up the image
Small heater heats cathode (-), emits electron
cloud that is focused into an electron beam by
two anodes(+): accelerating anode and focusing
anode.
Black-and-white monitors only have one electron
gun; color monitors have three (RGB).
 Variations of CRTs
Metal screen filled with holes sitting just behind
phosphor layer. Electron guns each send beam
through hole to a single pixel triad of tubes phosphor
layer.

Aperture Grill - Looks kind of like a grill; with lines

jutting down the screen packed together in strips

Shadow Mask - packed together in clusters. If you

look closely, you can see little individual dots, known
as pixels
 Why So Big and Bulky?

Standard cathode ray tube technology requires

a certain distance between beam projection
device and screen (kind of like mile-long
particle accelerators).
How Long has it Been Around?
 Invented in 1896 by Ferdinand Braun.

First used for oscilloscopes, then for television, and

finally for computers.

Philo Farnsworth developed the cathode ray tube that

would be used for television and other electronic
displays.

Responsible for many contributions to physics, but this

is a computer programming class, not a physics class.
 Some Various Information
If you work near the back of a cathode ray
computer monitor, youll be dosed with
more radiation than if you were working at
the front of it.

Do not put a power magnet near a

cathode ray tube; can cause
magnetization of the shadow mask
 The Future of CRTs

Because CRTs now offer no real advantages

over LCD monitors, they will become
obsolete soon. The price of LCDs is already
decreasing.
FLATPANEL DISPLAYS
 Contents
INTRODUCTION
TYPES OF FLAT PANEL DISPLAYS
APPLICATIONS OF FLAT PANEL
DISPLAYS
ADVANTAGES OF FLAT PANEL DISPLAYS
DISADVANTAGES OF
FLAT PANEL DISPLAYS
HOW FLAT PANEL WORK AND
MANUFACTURED
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FLAT PANEL DISPLAYS
AND CRT
 INTRODUCTION
The first ever flat panel display was invented
in 1964 at the University of Illinois.
Flat panel displays also called Flat Screen.
It encompass a growing number of electronic
visual display technologies.
It enables much lighter and thinner than
traditional television set and video displays
that use cathode ray tubes (CRT).
These are usually less than 100 mm
(4 inches) thick.
 Types

VOLATILE FLAT PANEL DISPLAYS

STATIC FLAT PANEL DISPLAYS

Volatile Flat Panel Displays

Volatile displays require that pixels be periodically

refreshed.
This refresh typically occurs many times a second.

Some examples of volatile flat panel displays :-

Light-emitting diode displays (LED)
Liquid crystal displays (LCDs)
Organic light-emitting diode (OLED)
Plasma displays
 STATIC FLAT PANEL
DISPLAYS

These rely on materials whose color states

are bistable.
This results in a much more energy-
efficient display.
These require slow refresh rates.
 Other Different types of flat
panel displays

Liquid crystal display (LCD)

Plasma display panel (PDP)
Light emitting diode (LED) display
Organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs)
 Liquid crystal display (LCD)

LCDs are the established technology for a

broad range of uses.

LCDs take up less

space, weigh less
and use less power.
 Plasma display panel (PDP)

Their visual displays

are comparable to cathode ray tubes,
but can be builtmuch thinner and flatter.
These are not suitable
for portable and handheld devices.
 Light emitting diode (LED)
display
These used for large, outdoor screens and
billboards.
Each pixel is formed using
a cluster of red, green and
blue LEDs.
 Organic light emitting diodes
(OLEDs)
OLEDs are self-emissive, highly efficient
and have excellent optical properties.
There are two principle
technologies of OLED:-
Vacuum Deposition
Systems
Solution Processable
OLED Systems
APPLICATIONS OF FLAT PANEL
DISPLAYS

Laptops

Televisions

Cellular phones

Digital cameras

Camcorders

Compact cameras

Pocket video camera

ADVANTAGES OF FLAT PANEL
DISPLAYS

Space Saving
Display size
Power consumption
 DISADVANTAGES OF
FLATPANEL DISPLAY
Durability
Color
Viewing Angle
Price
 LCD
 Working

Liquid crystals
Passive LCDs
Active matrix LCDs
Colored LCDs
 Liquid crystals

Setup of a typical LCD panel:

Polarizer
Glass substrate
Seal
Spacer
ITO
Hard coat
Polyimide
TFT
 Passive Display

A passive matrix LCD is composed of

several layers.
The main parts are:-
Two glass plates
Connected by seals
 Active matrix LCDs
Active matrix technology is using thin-film
transistors (TFT).
They are produced in
tube furnaces.
 Color LCDs
Color filters are applied to the inside of the
front glass sheet.
Three colors red, blue, green and a black
matrix are used.
 How LCDs are manufactured?
The rear glass plates are the substrate for
the TFT production in case of active matrix
LCDs.
The front glass plate wears the color filter
layers, same as the rear glass plate ITO,
hard coat and polyimide and the sealing.
The singularized displays are filled with
liquid crystal liquid and the opening in the
seal is closed.
 DIFFERENCE BETWEEN FLAT
PANEL DISPLAYS AND CRT?
Resolution & Viewing Quality
Refresh Rate
Physical Size
Price
 MFD
A schematic example of a multi-function display
 Multi-function display

A multi-function display (MFD) (part of multi-

function structures) is a small screen
(CRT or LCD) surrounded by multiple soft
keys (configurable buttons) that can be used to
display information to the user in numerous
configurable ways.
MFDs originated in aviation, first in military
aircraft, and later were adopted by commercial
aircraft, general aviation (GA), and automotive
use.
 Often an MFD will be used in concert with
a primary flight display, and forms a
component of a glass cockpit. MFDs are
part of the digital era of modern planes or
helicopter.
The first MFD were introduced by air
forces in the late 1960s and early 1970s;
an early example is the F-111D (first
ordered in 1967, delivered from 197073).
 The advantage of an MFD over analog
display is that an MFD does not
consume much space in the cockpit, as
data can be presented in multiple pages,
rather than always being present at once.
 MFK
The Multi-Function Keyboard.
The Multi Function Keyboard (MFK) is an
avionics sub-system through which the
pilot interacts toconfigure mission related
parameters like flight plan, airfield
database, communication equipment
during initialization and operation flight
phase of mission.
 The MFK consists of a MOTOROLA 68000 series
processor with ROM, RAM and EEPROM memory.

It is connected to one of the 1553B buses used for

data communication. It is also connected to the Multi
Function Rotary switch (MFR) through a RS422
interface.

The MFK has a built-in display unit and a keyboard.

The display unit is a pair of LCD based Colour

Graphical Display, as well as aMonochrome
Heads-Up Display.
 The Real-time operating specifications
are very stringent in such applications
because the
performance and safety of the aircraft
depend on it. Efficient design of the
architecture and code
is required for successful operation.
 Technology Highlights:
 Virtual cockpit
 Everything in view, directly in front of the
driver the Audi virtual cockpit, a fully
digital instrument cluster, is completely driver-
focused.

The 12.3-inch display depicts information

in high resolution.