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Airbus selected Serco Test Systems Inc., a National Instruments Alliance Partner, to refurbish its wind-tunnel facility in Filton, United Kingdom, to include a new data acquisition and control system and an updated control room environment. To accomplish this task, the companies selected DIAdem and National Instruments LabVIEW software, as well as NI FieldPoint distributed I/O hardware, for developing the data acquisition and control system. With the new system, Airbus wind-tunnel test engineers can simulate a variety of flight situations to measure the effects of multiple parameters, such as wind, temperature and force, on a model airplane.
Airbus wind-tunnel test engineers also can take advantage of the DIAdem DataPlugin technology to read their proprietary data exchange format, which they developed to archive and share their test data and results among multiple facilities. With support for their critical aerodynamics data in DIAdem, Airbus wind-tunnel test engineers at different sites across Europe can immediately access interpretable test data quickly on their desktop PCs, interactively compare historical and current wind-tunnel test data and collaborate to make important decisions for improving performance and handling quality as well as other characteristics of their airliners.
Airbus engineers working on wind-tunnel data can share their data across a central server and, with DIAdem as their analysis tool, they can generate reports based on the parameters they require. Also, they can read their reports in formats that help them better analyze their data, such as 2-D, 3-D and polar graphs. For more information about DIAdem, visit www.ni.com/diadem.