Marconi Avionics (E665) is showing its HUD technology, having just won a contract for development of a Commercial Off The Shelf-based (COTS) replacement Head Up Display Electronics Unit (HUD EU) for the Lockheed Martin F-16.
The contract covers development, flight qualification and demonstration. The existing HUD EU, which has been in service since the early 1980s, is beginning to experience unavoidable component obsolescence. Under this latest development programme a new, fully flight-qualified EU will be developed and tested as a drop-in replacement for the existing EU.
The new EU will also provide significant room for growth using vacant module slots and the existing power supply.
In addition to improved support and functionality the new HUD EU will be capable of rapidly updating software. Current EU updating requires removal, erasure, reprogramming and refit of a UVEPROM, a task taking between four and six hours. The new EU will be capable of completing this task in minutes.
This latest contract award reaffirms Marconi's significant involvement in the F-16 programme. To date Marconi has supplied every F-16 HUD Display Unit in use worldwide.
Source: Flight Daily News
