ALLFlight - A full scale enhanced and synthetic vision sensor suite for helicopter applications

Abstract

In 2008 the German Aerospace Center (DLR) started the project ALLFlight (Assisted Low Level Flight and Landing on Unprepared Landing Sites). This project deals with the integration of a full scale enhanced vision sensor suite onto the DLR’s research helicopter EC135. This sensor suite consists of a variety of imaging sensors, including a color TV camera and an un-cooled thermal infrared camera. Two different ranging sensors are also part of this sensor suite: an optical radar scanner and a millimeter wave radar system. Both radar systems are equipped with specialized software for experimental modes, such as terrain mapping and ground scanning. To be able to process and display the huge incoming flood of data from these sensors, a compact high performance sensor co-computer system (SCC) has been designed and realized, which can easily be installed into the helicopter’s cargo bay. A sophisticated, high performance, distributed data acquisition, recording, processing, and fusion software architecture has been developed and implemented during the first project year. The paper describes the challenging mechanical integration of such a comprehensive sensor suite onto the EC135 and explains the architectural hard- and software concept and the implementation on the SCC.