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UTSI Flight Simulation Laboratory

The UTSI Flight Simulation Laboratory hosts an engineering simulation based on a Simulink implementation of the equations of motion. The laboratory is currently being used to support a NASA task for Mars Airplane simulation. The laboratory is constructed to allow both batch and real time interactive simulations. The Simulink simulation can be modified to accommodate a wide variety of aircraft and drives visuals to a wide variety of simulation systems such as X-Plane®, FlightGear as well as custom visualizations.

The laboratory is about to be upgraded with incorporation of a full wrap-around visual system and a mechanical cockpit. This will provide the capability to build engineering quality simulations and perform flight evaluations on a wide variety of aircraft.

In addition to the Simulink-based simulator, the flight simulation laboratory contains three PC-based flight simulators. One of these is configured with hardware to simulate fighter-type aircraft controls, another is configured to simulate general-aviation type aircraft controls, and the third is configured to simulate a glider-type aircraft controls. These three PC-based flight simulators can use a variety of commercial off the shelf simulation packages (X-Plane®, FlightGear, and Orbiter) and use of these systems is integrated into the instruction in the experimental flight mechanics courses in performance flight testing and stability and control flight testing.

The Flight Simulation Laboratory is connected to the Flight Systems Laboratory so that the computers in the Flight Systems Laboratory can be used as a “Mission Control” to monitor as wide variety of parameters of the simulation as it runs. This will be used for both rapid simulation development as well as training in control room types of operations.