DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT OF MFD PAGES FOR FIGHTER AIRCRAFT USING FLIGHTGEAR FLIGHT SIMULATOR DATA OUTPUT

Abstract

Modern fighter aircraft are equipped with various sensors which provide a considerable amount of information to the aircrew. These sensors send data to various systems via the avionics data bus. This data is processed by the Display Processor and utilized by the Multi-Functional Displays or MFDs to present the information in a form that helps the pilot to easily process the information and help him to accomplish the mission. The Multi Functional Display or MFD is a type of electronic display system used in aircraft to process and present critical information. This study presents a typical Multi-Functional Display (MFD) that combines fundamental functions that can be processed and presented to the aircrew in the form of various pages to provide a precise, informative, and personalized flight display. It differs from a standard display since it can handle several applications on a single piece of hardware. The earlier aircraft cockpits were equipped with various analog instruments and gauges. However, in the present generation of aircraft, they are replaced by modern glass cockpits. Flight data and information required for an aircraft are now displayed in a single integrated screen, which is the MFD. Fighter aircraft pilots depend on MFDs to get vital information regarding the aircraft's flight condition, system health, and current mission status. MFD page design and development is a challenging process that necessitates giving careful thought to the demands of the pilot and the information that matters most to them in each particular scenario. The key functions of the MFD have been defined in various pages such as Primary Flight Display (PFD), System operation, and Navigation page. In our study, the FlightGear Flight simulator was used to provide real-time flight data for developing the MFD System. Since it is not possible to obtain the data from a real aircraft for now. Therefore, the Flightgear property tree was effectively used for the Design, Development, and for testing of the pages. As a future scope, real-time data from a drone or a UAV or even data from an actual aircraft can be used to run the MFD pages.