@NigD
I've seen you are an engineer and here are now some engineers words.
EC develops that ship for the german DLR, the german aerospace center as a primarily inflight helicopter simulator. The EC 135 called ACT/FHS, Active Control Technology Demonstrator/Flying Helicopter Simulator, is a unique, advanced airborne testbed. The aim of the development project, which is commonly funded by the German Ministry of Defense, DLR, and industry, is to validate key technologies for the future generation military and civil helicopters for extending the flight operation in direction of 24h and all- weather conditions. EC 135 ACT/FHS is designed to allow the in-flight evaluation of new control technologies, cockpit designs, and man-machine interfaces in a real environment and with the pilot in the loop. A/c is a normal serial ship s/n 28 and refitted with fly-by-light technology, smart actuators, high speed processors, state-of-the-art sensors, and advanced, programmable display systems. Accordingly, the system is structured with a hierarchical architecture and consists of two associated on-board units, a core system, developed by industry, and an experimental system, developed by the DLR.
Core system:
The core system, which is a four times redundant direct link (1:1) fly-by-light control system, is designed with a 10-9 failure probability in accordance with the operational certification requirements.
It's the redundant direct link fly-by-light system, which is the primary control system for both pilots without any restrictions in the flight envelope. The main structure is composed of the quadruplex pilot input position sensors, the four-lane control signal processing computer (CSPC), and "smart" actuators for the four axes, each supplied with a four-lane actuator electronics box, which is an integral part of the actuator block and performs internally the closed loop actuator control. The CSPC is the central processing unit of the core system, where the functions for switching, fading, and blending between the modes, the signal monitoring, and the signal filtering are implemented. The CSPC is the only interface to the experimental system. In the experimental mode, the evaluation pilot’s control inputs are transferred via CSPC to the experimental flight control computer and the rotor control commands are sent to the actuators.
Experimental system:
The experimental system is designed as a simplex system and fulfills the demands of a modular multi-role system. The prospects for future system modifications and an extension of system redundancy are considered. It's designed as a fail-safe system and consists of the flight control computer, the data management computer, two multi-function displays with the graphics processors, various sensors, interfaces to the basic helicopter equipment, and the data acquisition and telemetry system. Standard type interfaces are provided to allow integration of additional components. The modularity provides the capability to easily replace or add individual components and to modify or extend the system.
The installation of side arm controllers is optional. For the pilots, the control and display units (CDU) for the core and experimental systems are integrated in the center console. The test engineer can use a multi-function display and the CDU for the experimental system, which are installed in the engineers panel. In addition, he can use quick look and experimental system management capabilities.
Not uncommon for a unique and new technology ship, EC is unfortunately behind the development schedule.
The first flight of the converted EC 135 s/n 28 , initially scheduled for 2000, took part on 28/01/02. As a precursor DLR has utilized a BO 105 "fly by wire" until the helo crashed in 1995.
The new ship will be operated by DLR and will serve as a technology testbed until about 2020.
Engines and the main parts are the same as serial.
And NigD
it's fitted with TWO collectives and "Praise the lord, there is a future" needs human pilots (with engineering background) to leave the good ol' earth...