Man-in-the-loop Simulators: Training Simulators

Hughes: Training Simulation

Hughes Aircraft Simulator Hughes Training, Inc., in Arlington, Texas, has developed reconfigurable combat aircraft simulators for the U.S. Air Force and Air National Guard as part of the Unit Training Device (UTD) program. Each simulator incorporates high-resolution, out-the-window visuals and a cockpit with displays and controls designed to function just as they would in a real aircraft. The UTD is a deployable simulator designed to train pilots in four areas: emergency procedures, instrument flying in bad weather, air-to-air combat and weapons employment, and air-to ground tactics.

All UTD functionality is supported by a single 4-processor Onyx RealityEngine2 system; this job required three separate computer systems in previous-generation trainers. The Onyx graphics supercomputer handles calculations for aerodynamics, equations of motion, avionics, and digital radar landmass simulations, and provides out-the-window visuals and heads-down displays. All functions run at a minimum frame rate of 30 Hz.

IRIX with REACT, running on the Onyx RealityEngine2 graphics supercomputer, is a fully deterministic, standards-based environment that can easily be modified to simulate different aircraft, and upgraded to handle even more complex simulations in the future.

STN ATLAS Electronik GmbH: Networked Training with AGPG

Combat Training Simulator The Simulation Division of STN ATLAS Electronik GmbH in Bremen, Germany, is developing a combat training simulator, AGPG, for the German army, which will be used to train Marder infantry vehicle crews. Based on the Distributed Interactive Simulation (DIS) protocol, the simulator will train platoons of complete Marder crews working together in simulated combat. A full training scenario will consist of 160 moving objects, including 80 un-piloted automated friendly and enemy mobile combat vehicles in a dynamic terrain.

Each manned tank is simulated using a number of parallel VME-based 68040 processors. These computers communicate via FDDI with a CHALLENGE server that controls both friendly and enemy un-piloted forces, manages the network, and coordinates the entire scenario. Using IRIX with REACT, these operations are performed deterministically at a frame rate of 25 Hz.The prototype was completed in mid-1994, and STN ATLAS Electronik will now build a complete simulation environment for combined combat training that incorporates many different types of vehicles for the German army. The scalable open architecture of the AGPG using the CHALLENGE server will allow the STN ATLAS simulator to easily expand in both size and functionality in a very cost-effective way.