The MAE2010 (Military, Defense & Aerospace Electronics Technical Conference & Exhibition) conference kicked off today at the Royal Berkshire Conference Centre in Reading, Berkshire. As the UK’s only event dedicated to the field of embedded computing and integrated electronic systems designed for military, defense and aerospace applications, it’s an ideal venue to learn about the latest mil-aero innovations.
Produced by engineers for engineers, MAE is the industry’s premier one-day technology forum focused on the design and development of military, defense and aerospace electronic systems. The conference is built around a day of technical seminars which have been carefully selected by our independent judging panel of experts to inform and educate engineering professionals on the key topics in this challenging environment; helping them to make more informed decisions for their current and future design projects.
As an industry leader in designing and manufacturing system host boards, backplanes and integrated computer systems for military and aerospace applications, Trenton was invited to speak at the event. Jim Renehan, Director of Marketing, took the opportunity to give an application presentation entitled: High-Density Computing Systems in Surveillance and Communications Applications.
RC-135V/W Rivet Joint Aircraft
The challenge for Trenton’s engineering team involved the need to design a rugged airborne computing platform for the Boeing RC-135V/W (Rivet Joint) aircraft. Outfitted with the latest intelligence gathering hardware and software, each Rivet Joint aircraft will contain 65 to 75 high-density cluster computer systems.
- Computer hardware mounting locations are limited
- Reducing Size, Weight and Power (SWaP) is critical
- All hardware must be Commercial-Off-The-Shelf (COTS)
- Height cannot exceed 5U, depth must not exceed 23”
- System must support up to four single board computers
- Each SBC must be powered by an independent power supply
- Long deployment cycle of seven to ten years
To fulfill this requirement the Trenton TRC5000 rackmount computer was developed. The aluminum chassis is populated with four Trenton JXT6966 single board computers in addition to a four-segment BP4FS6890 PCI Express backplane. As each SBC features two, quad-core processors that support Intel® Virtualization Technology, each rackmount computer can execute up to 32 unique applications simultaneously. In addition, this configuration replaces sixteen 1U rackmount enclosures for a 70% rack space savings inside the aircraft.
Trenton's TRC5000 Rackmount Computer
Remember that an aircraft can have up to seventy-five systems, so this space savings is repeated many times throughout the plane. The space savings supplied by the Trenton high-density computer system also comes with a cumulative weight savings advantage because the solution requires fewer cables, enclosures and power supplies.
The long-life product support provided by the Intel® Embedded and Communication Group allows the OEM to utilize Trenton Systems hardware to meet the stability and longevity requirements of the RIVET JOINT upgrade program. Trenton also designs in other extended life components to ensure that the completed computer systems meet and exceed the deployment cycle requirements for the aircraft.
Trenton single board computers and multi-segment backplanes bring the same space and efficiency benefits as seen in the RC-135V/W aircraft to a diverse variety of embedded computing applications. For more information about this application, and the other computer system configurations developed for this airborne computing project, download the High-Density Computing Systems white paper. You can also check out Trenton’s full line of rugged and MIL-STD-810 military computing platforms.
