Rockwell Collins' next generation avionics and pilot control systems contributed to the first flight of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner airplane on Tuesday, Dec. 15.    

"We congratulate Boeing and all who've worked to make this historic day possible," said Kelly Ortberg, executive vice president and chief operating officer for Commercial Systems at Rockwell Collins. "I'm particularly proud of the Rockwell Collins team for delivering on our commitments for the 787 Dreamliner. The systems we've created represent the most advanced technology available for air transport aircraft, which ultimately means more efficient operations for airlines and their passengers."  

Rockwell Collins serves as the systems supplier for the Boeing 787 flight deck display system, crew alerting system, pilot controls, communication and surveillance systems, and the core network cabinet. Rockwell Collins also provides the common data network for the airplane's Common Core System.    

Rockwell Collins' provides the following systems for the Boeing 787 airplane:  

·          An integrated display system featuring five 15.1-inch diagonal LCD displays, as well as dual LCD head-up displays (HUD).  The Rockwell Collins Head-up Guidance System (HGSTM) provides the most advanced display capabilities available in the air transport market, including primary flight, advanced navigation and complete crew alerting functionality. The system utilizes cursor control devices and a multi-function key pad for data entry and retrieval.  

·          Rockwell Collins VHF-2100, SAT-2100 and HFS 900D state-of-the-art communications capabilities including the lighter weight, highly reliable VHF-2100 is VDL Mode 2 capable with future growth to VDL Mode 3 and 4. The new, smaller and more reliable SAT-2100 supports the International Civil Aviation Organization's safety services, as well as three channels of voice communications and offers growth to future Inmarsat Swift Broadband high-speed data capabilities. As part of the communications package, Rockwell Collins is also providing a state of the art digital flight deck audio system, and the cockpit voice and flight data recording system.  

·          Rockwell Collins' newly developed Integrated Surveillance System (ISS) including the company's MultiScanTM Hazard Detection System, traffic alert and collision avoidance, Mode S surveillance, and terrain awareness and warning capabilities.   

·          The latest generation of pilot controls with a control stand that includes auto throttles, and pitch, roll, yaw and primary flight controls, as well as their interfaces to the aircraft's fly-by-wire systems. The modular design of the pilot controls will simplify installation and maintenance. This new system meets Boeing's objective of providing operators with a look and feel similar to the Boeing 777, while achieving significant weight savings.  

·          The Core Network, offered as standard on the 787, which plays a key role in Boeing's objective to 'e-enable' the entire aircraft. Utilizing commercial open standard computing servers and networks, the Core Network hosts a wide range of third-party applications and manages onboard information flow to improve airline operational efficiency.  

·          The Common Data Network (CDN), which advances Rockwell Collins' leadership as a supplier of advanced networking technologies. As a key component of the 787 Common Core System, the CDN is a high integrity, bi-directional fiber optic and copper network that uses ARINC 664 protocols and standards to manage the information flow between the aircraft's onboard systems. Based on commercial Ethernet technology adapted to the avionics environment, the integrity and deterministic characteristics of Rockwell Collins' CDN allows systems integrators to utilize this network for systems requiring a high level of data criticality. The CDN offers significant improvements over current generation data buses including expanded connectivity, higher data rates and significant reductions in aircraft weight when compared with point to point topologies.  

During the development and design process, Rockwell Collins has served on Boeing's 787 Partner Council and has employees working onsite at Boeing participating in day-to-day program design, integration and production activities.  

In addition to leadership and engineering support, Rockwell Collins has used its service center in the region – the Kent, Wash., service center – to actively support the program. Much of Rockwell Collins' work for 787 has been done at the company's facilities in Iowa; Melbourne, Fla.; Irvine, Calif.; and Portland, Ore.