Simulated Reality

Ask anyone in the aerospace industry to name a major flight simulator company, and chances are they’ll say “CAE.” With about 8,000 employees working at 100 sites in 30 countries, CAE is a global simulation powerhouse. It is also Canadian, and although it is by far the largest simulation company in the country, it most certainly isn’t alone in the field. In fact, there are several other Canadian firms making their mark in the world of aviation-related simulation.

CAE’s headquarters and main plant are located at Montréal’s Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport in Dorval, Que. The company specializes in constructing cockpit simulators for both wide and narrow-bodied aircraft – plus helicopters – in both the civil and military sectors. Its lineup includes the Airbus A380 and the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. Recently, the company has also been exploring new business opportunities, particularly in medical and mining simulation.

“We have about 3,500 people working here in our facility, which is about one million square feet in size,” said Robert Leclerc, CAE’s VP of global engineering, technology and operations. “We produce north of 50 to 60 full-flight simulators every year, plus flight training devices (FTDs), and desktop training systems.”

Mechtronix is another Montreal-based simulator company. Although not as big as CAE, Mechtronix also sells to the global market. “In fact, 90 per cent of our sales are international,” said Fernando Petruzziello, Mechtronix’s CEO and co-founder. “We build and sell five to six full-flight simulators annually, plus a host of FNPTs (flight navigational procedure trainers) and FTDs.” According to Mechtronix-supplied data obtained from Halldale Media Group, the two Canadian companies, CAE and Mechtronix, currently have a total of 576 full-flight simulators operating worldwide, out of a global total of 1,323.

A pioneer in the application of computers to flight simulation, Mechtronix operates in a 15,000-square-foot headquarters in Côte de Liesse, Que.; slightly to the east of Trudeau International Airport. The company specializes in narrow-bodied simulators for aircraft such as the Airbus A320/A330, ATR 72 and the Boeing 737.

But simulation applications aren’t limited to the cockpit. Cabin attendants must learn their trade before stepping into the aircraft – and flight crews need to become familiar with managing in-cabin situations such as opening emergency hatches and deploying slides. This is where Mississauga, Ont.-based Aviation Reproduction comes in: they make complete and partial cabin simulators to replicate aircraft such as the Airbus A320 and the Gulfstream family.

“Traditionally, cabin training was done using actual aircraft,” explained Aviation Reproduction President Danny Ferrone. “This required keeping the aircraft grounded, and tying up cabin attendants and pilots for training during off-hours.”

Add the fact that it can cost up to $10,000 to repack a deployed emergency exit slide, and the need for realistic cabin trainers is apparent. 

“That is where we meet the market’s needs by providing cabin simulators for customers around the world,” Ferrone said. “Using one of our partial or complete trainers, flight crew and cabin attendants can realistically rehearse everything they need to know; at convenient times, and for far less money.”

On the most basic level, Canada’s simulation industry includes those who create Canadian landscapes for personal computer flight simulator programs. That’s the purpose of Flight Ontario, a group of Microsoft Flight Simulator enthusiasts who have created freeware VFR scenery for their favourite program. Their work brings Canadian airports to life in the popular game, including Toronto’s City Centre Airport and approach, Ottawa’s Rockcliffe Airport, and Thunder Bay, Ont.; plus scenery for other provinces as well.

Flight Ontario’s goal is “to create Freeware VFR scenery packages, as real as it gets, for the benefit of flight simmers worldwide, with the hope that our work would inspire others to create their own sceneries,” said Flight Ontario Chairman Jim Kanold. “It has been my personal goal for years to create scenery that a flight school would find worthy for use in training.”

Taken as a whole, flight simulation companies such as CAE, Mechtronix, and Aviation Reproduction have established Canada’s reputation at the very highest levels of the flight simulation industry. “Our products are so respected that the OEMs themselves order them from us for their own training, rather than build their own units,” said CAE’s Leclerc. “Meanwhile, the state of simulator technology has become so advanced that Bombardier is now using our simulation technology to model the performance of its new CSeries family of jet liners – even before the first one has been flown.”

Types of Flight Simulators

If you were a student pilot in France in 1909, you may have trained on the Antoinette Barrel Trainer. Designed to mimic the flight characteristics of the Antoinette monoplane, this primitive simulator consisted of two half-barrels balanced on top of each other. The top barrel held a pilot’s seat and a steering wheel that controlled pitch and roll; just as in the real Antoinette aircraft. The pilot had a foot-controlled rudder to handle yaw, and a front-mounted reference bar to serve as the horizon. The bottom half-barrel was mounted on a swivel head, and was moved around by instructors to create changes in three axes of flight. 

“Thanks to this very simple arrangement, the trainee pilot only kept his balance by correctly manipulating the different controls,” said a Halldale Media Group article, “A History of Simulation” (halldale.com/insidesnt/history-simulation-part-ii-early-days). “He thus gradually familiarised himself with the delicate manoeuvres required to fly the Antoinette monoplane.”

Fortunately, modern simulators have come a long way since the Antoinette Barrel. Although there are many specific kinds of simulators in use today, aviation regulators and manufacturers generally divide them into three classes: full-flight simulators; flight navigation and procedures trainers (FNPTs); and flight training devices (FTDs), which can be as simple as desktop PC-based simulator programs.

Full-flight trainers are the Rolls-Royces of flight simulators. These are completely enclosed cockpits that, on the inside, look and respond exactly like whatever aircraft they have been designed to replicate. “We use avionics that have either been purchased directly from the appropriate avionics manufacturers, or model them ourselves as accurate 3D simulations,” said Leclerc.

It is not just the avionics that create a convincing illusion of reality: full-flight trainers look out onto wraparound high definition video displays (either projected or generated on external monitors) that move horizontally and vertically in response to the pilots’ stick and pedal movements. Thanks to a range of audio speakers mounted around the enclosure, and the fact that the cockpit pod is mounted on a six-axis moving base, the pilots also hear and feel as if they are actually in flight; rather than safely on the ground.

Within this realistic environment, it is not surprising that pilots soon forget they are in a full-flight simulator; especially when the instructor throws them into a hair-raising, pseudo-life-threatening situation. “It doesn’t take long for pilots to suspend any disbelief and become engrossed in simulator training,” said Mechtronix’s Petruzziello. “Only a few minutes have to pass for them to become completely engrossed.” 

Full-flight simulators play a key role in initial and recurrent pilot training, allowing for skill evaluation under all conditions – a requirement for commercial pilots in Canada, and many other countries, to keep their licences.

Flight navigation and procedures trainers (FNPTs) offer the same internal cockpit and outer display realism found in full-motion simulators, but without the six-axis moving base. As a result, FNPTs don’t rock up-and-down or side-to-side; a factor that reduces their price tag while keeping them useful for most levels of flight training. FNPTs are used for some levels of pilot training and recertification. (Note: Both FNPTs and full-flight simulators can be built into “green tail” enclosures – meaning that they are suited for a range of aircraft models – or, enclosures designed specifically for one aircraft type.)

Flight training devices (FTDs) create the illusion of flight through a combination of computer-generated graphics shown on one or more monitors, and a range of input devices that can be as complex as stick-and-rudder mockups, or as simple as a computer keyboard and a mouse. As such, FTDs are ideally suited for training new pilots in the early stages of flight school, but cannot substitute for either in-flight training or work in a FNPT or full-flight simulator.

On the Factory Floor

Building a modern simulator requires a fusion of OEM-supplied flight data, convincing flight graphics, and accurate responses from whatever input devices are used.

Nowhere is this more true than for the king of training, the full-flight simulator. This explains why CAE requires a vast, open factory to produce its units. 

“It looks like the floor of a major aircraft factory, except that it is comprised of individual stations where the simulators are built stage-by-stage,” said Robert Leclerc. Surprisingly, most of the factory has a high but not too-tall ceiling: “We only have an extended ceiling at the end of the line, where the full-flight simulator enclosure is mated to a six-axis base and video inputs for testing,” he explained.

Life for a CAE full-flight simulator starts upside down. “We have the platform upside down at the first bay so that we can install all the necessary piping and conduits for the six-axis mounts and cabling,” explained Leclerc. 

From here, the enclosure is rolled from station to station. After the platform is assembled, the shell is added. Next, the main instrument panels are installed, followed by racks for the computers.

“At this point, we install the control box,” Leclerc said. “This is a critical assembly that incorporates the control yokes, the rudder pedals, and the centre console.” Collectively, these are the items that define the operational elements of each aircraft type. 

The control box is a very important module, because the human-controlled parts provide actual feedback to the pilot in terms of resistance and vibration. After all, when a student is pushing a simulator past its programmed limit, the simulator needs to make this fact as clear as possible through sound, shake, and feel.

Next, these elements are added: avionics, internal monitors, video projectors (if used), outside-of-window screens and/or displays, front panel speakers, and controlling computers. The pilots’ chairs are installed, as is the instructor’s seat behind them. So are all the little details that make these full-flight simulators so realistic, right down to the colour scheme and aircraft logos. After all, the best full-flight simulator is one that is so complete and believable, it can’t be distinguished from the real thing once you’re inside.

“When this has all been done, we move the completed enclosure to the testing bay, mount it on the six-axis base, connect the video/data inputs and put it through its paces,” said Leclerc. “Only after it has gone through its own ‘flight school’ and passed, do we take it apart and ship it to our customers; whether in the next city, or on the other side of the world.”

Looking to the Future

Both CAE and Mechtronix live at the cutting-edge of simulator technology. In fact, Mechtronix was founded by five Concordia University graduate students in 1987 – Petruzziello was one of them – after they built a computer-controlled flight simulator for the National Research Council of Canada. 

“We had to wait a while for reasonably-sized computers to catch up with our programming,” Petruzziello said. “It wasn’t until the mid-1990s that PCs had enough power to make our form of flight simulation practical. Today, you can get more power in a laptop than we had in a roomful of computers 25 years ago.”

Both Mechtronix and CAE see a future where virtual reality could play a role in flight training. “However, there is a limit to how much we can train pilots with virtual reality,” said Leclerc. “Because their job is to fly in physical cockpits inside actual aircraft, the best simulators must faithfully simulate these conditions as closely as possible. So although virtual reality might help in FTDs, for instance, I can’t see it being used extensively in full-flight simulators.”

In the meantime, CAE, Mechtronix, and firms like Aviation Reproduction will keep pushing the envelope in flight simulation. In doing so, they’ll enhance the safety of flight crews and passengers alike – while keeping Canada at the forefront of the global simulation market.

“The exceptional quality of our products and services, as well as the talent of our engineers, programmers and other professionals, has positioned Canada as an undisputed leader in simulation and training,” observed Jim Quick, president and CEO of the Aerospace Industries Association of Canada (AIAC). “This thriving sector of the Canadian aerospace industry is expected to constitute an even greater part of the industry’s competitiveness in coming years.”

What will they think of next? 

 

James Careless writes on aerospace issues for Canadian Skies, Vertical, Rotorhub and Aviation Maintenance magazines. He is a two-time winner of the PBI Media Award for Editorial Excellence.