Avionics Bending: EFIS Control Panel

Hello here we'll talk about the Captain and FO EFIS Control panels.

Those panels are mounted in the Throttle quadrant stand (P10) left and right of the lever block.

The unit is powered by 115VAC 400Hz provided by Captain Instrument Xfer bus bus for captain and FO Instrument Xfer bus for First Officer.
The power part include 5VAC lighting, DC and chassis GND and announciators BRT/DIM and TEST

The unit features 2 potentiometers that directly act on brightness for respective ADI and EHSI displays. The EHSI one is dual concentric to control also the balance of the screen as you can state from following diagrams:

 

EHSI

ADI

 



In the second picture you can note the connection between the control panel and the ADI display;
on the right you can also note the primary ARINC transmission channel which will transmit the DH set on the display as well as the range, mode and display options (ARPT,NAVAID,RTE DATA, WPT) selected on the panel.
The display mode (MAP,PLAN,VOR,ILS) is also sent out with discretes to interface to other equipemens like the VOR tuning panel as you can see in the following diagram:

 

The WXR display is set on as a discrete interfaced to the weather radar control panel located in the pedestal stand (P8)

 



Here is a video of power up test. Enjoy!

Avionics bending: ACARS Control unit

Hello guys, here is a shot and a video of ACARS control display unit mounted in P8 panel.

It works on 115V 400Hz supply and at this stage only power up can be done till I will receive the V1 ARINC device to try to test some 429 labels with it.

First pics as Always includes the wiring diagram for it:

And here is a picture of Diagnostic section.

 

As you can see, the unit has actually no inputs grounded which are the program pins and no data from the 2 data channels as no ARINC labels are sent to it. More will follow once V1 device will be here :)

 

Here is a video of power up test

 



Avionics bending: Transponder

The transponder I am using here is not from 767 but it was very cheap to get and has all functions needed, including TCAS settings.

The unit manufactured by collins features 2 connectors for 2 separate transponder unit comunication. Here is the pinout: (Thanks to my friend Curd for providing it to me)

So as you can see both functions are the same. So of our interest we have:

 

5VAC for panel backlight.

115VAC and return for unit power

Fail logic input

Air/Gnd discrete

ARINC data channel

 

Here are few shots of the unit powered up. Note when selected transponder 1 you see ---- cause I didn't power the xpdr 1 input.

 

And here is a video of it during power up test

 

 

Avionics bending: ILS tuning panel

Hello guys, now that finally I have a 400Hz power source I coulded do some power up tests to see that all modules were working.

First was ILS tuning panel. This panel is used to tune the ILS frequency and course sending the data via ARINC bus to the flight control computer.

It features 3 separate connectors. Each of them has the exactly same features so it gets 3 separate power feeds from different buses, and outs 3 separate data channels to L, C and R flight control computers.

Here is a pinout of the central channel connector:

As you see there is an ARINC bus channel, 115VAC 400Hz power feed, 5VAC for backlight, a park discrete that is sent when the freq is set to PARK (---.--) and a freq/test inhibit which is normally 28V feeded but it's grounded when the FCC )Flight control computer) commands it not to be able to change the freq, like during an autoland to avoid erroneous human intervention.

Here is a pic and video of the unit.

 

Temporary inverter

Hello guys. I just got a very vintage inverter that I will use for tests. By its technology it should be manufactured in the 50s so it's pretty old and I was impressed that it's still workin!!!

Here are the specs:

Input: 27.5 VDC at 37A
Output 115VAC 400Hz at 4.5A

This device basically has an electric motor that spins powered by the 28VDC generating a 400Hz wave corrected in the inverter circuitry to be stable at 115VAC tension.

This device is very very noisy but to do some tests looks like to be pretty good :)

Once it came I had to open it as the voltage output was steady at 85V...there is a potentiometer you can regulate to change output frequency: when I removed the cover the pot had an unsoldered connection, so I restored it and now perfectly works.

Also had to adjust the motor speed screw at the end of motor shaft to achieve a more correct frequency output.

Here are few shots and a video of spin up :)

 

Avionics bending: Mach/Airspeed indicator

Hello everybody, following here is the pinout diagram of the 757 / 767 mach / airspeed indicator.

This is a very neat unit. It is powered at 115VAC 400Hz from Instruments Xfer Bus and it features dual source ARINC bus. The data in the plane come from the ADCs (Air Data Computer) which compute various parameters such as static pressure, dynamic pressure, altitude and Others and compute the arinc words to drive the gauge for the following functions:

- Airspeed
- Barber Pole
- Mach number

The Speed command bug is also in ARINC format and is directly driven by the MCP (Mode Control Panel)

Here are shots and a small test video of the unit. Enjoy!

 

 

 

 

 



Avionics bending: Autoland status announciator

Hello people! Here we'll see the autoland status announciator mounted on 757 and 767 main instrument panel for both captain and first officer.

The unit features 2 rotating windows with 3 faces each and rotated by the action of 2 solenoids.
When unpowered or no autoland announciation is active the black face is shown.

The upper window shows LAND 2 or LAND 3 on green background to show when Autoland is activated.

The bottom window shows NO LAND 3 or NO AUTOLAND on orange background when for any reason the autoland in selected category can't be accomplished by Aircraft systems.

Here it is the pinout connection diagram for each unit:

As you can see the unit has 2 x 28VDC power sources, one provided by Aircraft battery and one by the left DC bus for the captain and from right DC bus for the first officer.

The announciators outputs are GND with reference to the 28vdc supply.

 





And here you can see a video of the unit in self test mode.

Avionics bending: Vertical speed indicator

Hello people, here you can see original B757 vertical speed indicator, no TCAS type, interfaced with V1 avionics device and workin along with Xplane. It was just a test, once the device will be ready for delivery it will be tested with FSX in 767 configuration.

Here it is the pinout connection diagram:

As you can see it's powered like most gauges at 115VAC 400Hz, the we have 2 arinc channels for dataflow which are switched by the selector input, actuated by a switch on the MIP.

Here are pics of the units along with a video

 

 

 

 

Avionics bending: Digital clock

Hello people, it's a long time since last post but I've been very busy with a work for a friend and to try to get some really rare 767 items and with some patience and money I am getting there...
I just received the 1st of 2 clocks I bought which are genuine 767!
I already tested it, it's been quite easy: as you can see in the following picture it has 2 28VDC feeds:
One coming from the HOT BAT BUS which powers the clock time base only and one from the BAT BUS which powers the logic and the displays
there is one ground per feed and one chassis ground.
Plus there are the feed and return for the backlight, the ARINC channel to send the GMT data bus and the remote controls from the glarewing panels to start and stop the chrono.

Following is a video of the clock in action...enjoy!

 

 



Avionics bending: Stabiliser Trim indicator

 

Hello! here you can see the stab trim indicator workin powered up at 26V 400Hz supply and driven by an ARINC to Syncro unit that converts the trim signal sent as ARINC word to syncro analog signal that drives the tape along his range.

It has been a test only, and the real implementation as hardware will come in future with the help of V1avionics interfaces.