Playing with the Navy's toys!

[allardjd 1,853]

How it Came to Happen

Tuesday last will be one of the memories of a lifetime. I

was privileged to get a chance to tour the facilities of the

US Navy's HSL-40 training squadron at NS Mayport FL

(near Jacksonville), including a few minutes hands-on in

an SH60B Seahawk flight simulator. In short, a raffle

ticket whose proceeds were to benefit the USO, won me

a place among 16 folks who were to be given a tour and

simulator ride. The USO is a civilian, non-profit organization

whose purpose is to support and assist the US serviceman

at home and abroad, particularly the lower echelons of

the enlisted ranks. It seemed a worthwhile cause, and I'd

considered the purchase a donation, never expecting to be a

winner. Against all odds, my ticket came out of the hat and I

was duly informed. After some anxious moments over a

possible conflict with jury duty, all was resolved and I was

able to go.

The Squadron

HSL-40, (Helicopter-ASW-Light) the Seawolves, is an

SH60B training squadron, qualifying helicopter pilots for

service in the fleet. They number about 350 people,

including around 40 instructor-pilots. At present, they train

about 90 pilots at a time and are in the process of stepping

that up to increase the annual throughput. The trainees

come and go more or less continuously, not in organized

classes. Trainees are already Naval Aviators, fresh from

Navy flight training and helicopter training in lighter aircraft,

bug smashers, as our tour guide referred to them. This

school provides their transition to the SH60B and readies

them for service in the fleet.

The Bird

The SH60B Seahawk is the Naval cousin of the more well

known Army Blackhawk. These are typically deployed

aboard medium sized Navy ships, cruisers, destroyers and

frigates, where they provide a vital element of the ship's

ASW capability, though the type may also be present at

shore stations and on other vessels. The models we saw

were, of course, configured for anti-submarine warfare,

though some of the various bits and pieces on the training

aircraft were dummies. They're equipped with sono-buoy

dispensers, a deployable magnetic anomaly detector and a

very capable radar, though they do not presently utilize a

dipping sonar. The SH60 is able to carry a small ASW

torpedo or a missile, possibly the Harpoon anti-ship missile

judging from the size, though this was not discussed. It has

about a 3-1/2 hr. endurance time and I didn't see anything

resembling a refueling probe.

The tour

We were treated to the usual military/government hurry-up-

and-wait routine at the front gate of the Mayport NS. It

seemed that we were indeed expected and pre-authorized,

but somehow, the three vehicles in which we arrived were

not. (It's true - you can't make this stuff up!) A half-hour

delay resulted, and the knot was finally cut by our sponsor,

the director of the local USO office, when she arrived. It

happens her husband is a Navy 4-striper (Captain) at Mayport.

A cell phone call from her quickly resulted in an incoming

phone call from who-knows-who to the processing desk and

suddenly all obstacles disappeared.

After a short ride to the squadron we debarked from our

freshly authorized vehicles and were met by the squadron

XO (Executive Officer), whose name I did not manage to get.

He was a 3-striper, a full Commander. After the obligatory

welcome speech, he introduced us to the squadron Public

Affairs Officer and left us in his charge. He, the PAO, proved

to be an interesting character indeed. Captain Mark Baille

(pronounced Bailey) of the Canadian Air Force is an

instructor-pilot with HSL-40, midway through a three-year

exchange program. Among his collateral duties is a stint as

PAO, so he became our tour guide, mentor, monitor and co-

pilot for the rest of the day. He proved to be friendly and

personable, knowledgeable and so far as I could judge,

competent, not only as a tour guide, but, it seems as a

chopper driver. I'm sure he'd rather have been flying, but if

he harbored any ill feelings about having to squire around a

bunch of civilians who didn't know much of anything about

helicopters or hockey, he hid it well.

If the people-are-authorized-vehicles-are-not ceremony at

the base gate was our first taste of military logic for the day,

it wasn't the last. All cameras and cell phones had to be

surrendered at the security desk before entering the

simulator building. This didn't seem too bizarre until after

our simulator session, when all were returned and we were

permitted to photograph anything and everything in the

maintenance hangar and on the flight line, including the

innards of partially dissected aircraft. I can only conclude

that the simulator technology is more sensitive than the

aircraft itself, or perhaps they'd just never gotten round to

declassifying the simulator portion. For whatever reason, it

was gephotoclikken und schtrobenflaschen verboten while in

the vicinity of the simulators.

As all the photos are ex-simulator, I'll provide a detailed text

description of the simulator portion of the day and follow that

with the photos, with brief captions where appropriate.

The simulators

Captain Baille began by describing the two kinds of

simulators used at HSL-40. There are a pair of full motion

boxes, one of which he showed us (they were idle, but

scheduled for others within minutes). He described them as

1980s technology, saying that the graphics were rather

rudimentary, but that the full motion feature made for very

realistic and effective training of certain segments of their

program. Each of these simulators occupies a good sized

room with a high ceiling. The "box" is supported on six

hydraulic actuators, attached to the floor in pairs. At each

floor attachment, a pair of cylinders form a vee and are

attached individually to the bottom of the simulator box (3

floor attachments, six box attachments). Thus, the six

cylinders, controlled by the simulator computer and

operating in conjunction with one another, create the motion.

I marvel at the geometry, as any motion of any cylinder has

to happen simultaneously with some motion of all the others,

but each different in rate and maybe even direction.

Attempting to move a single cylinder only would be

impossible, as the other five would "lock" the simulator box in

place. If one moves, all have to move, but each differently.

As an engineer I couldn't help but be impressed by the

control logic that must lie behind that cylinder geometry. It

must be like the empennage controls of a V-tail Bonanza,

times 3, only worse.

The simulator compartment floor is initially about seven or

eight feet above the room floor, and is accessed by a

catwalk drawbridge, which is folded back when the simulator

is started. At initialization, the simulator box rises a few feet

from the static position to put the hydraulic actuators near

the middle of their range of motion. I'd judge their stroke to

be about 5 feet. I didn't see the hydraulic pumps, but heard

them later in an adjacent room and they sounded huge. We

were told the box could move to actual deck angles of about

45 degrees, though in practice, the attitude of the box isn't

necessarily the same as the attitude of the simulated aircraft.

The hydraulics provide acceleration in the various axes, the

sense of banking, or changing attitude and direction. For

instance, a hard sideward yank of the cyclic might cause the

feeling of a lurch to one side, but if the pilot of the aircraft

then maintains that attitude, the actuators might sneak the

box back level slowly enough that the victim, er student

might not feel that motion. The magic is all in the computers,

and by all accounts the inner ear is soon completely

convinced that what the graphics and/or the instruments are

displaying is real.

The second type of simulator, and the one we were

permitted to use and abuse, was of the static type. HSL-40

has several of these, and they are heavily utilized. These

are more modern. Captain Baille said that the graphics of

these is generations better than the other boxes, and though

these didn't have the motion feature, did a better training job

on certain kinds of operations. Each type has its own

strengths and the Navy uses each for those things it's best

at. Since this version was created by a firm in San Diego

CA, this simulator starts the student at North Island NAS,

and the local scenery is the city of San Diego and the ocean,

coastline, desert and mountains that surround it. As most of

the training operations are over water, a wide geographical

range is not important. Also included, of course, are a wide

range of ships, aircraft, and presumably, the odd submarine.

So, on to our hands-on time. As I said there were 16 of us,

and we had originally been scheduled for an 80 minute

window in one simulator. As it turned out, we had less than

45 minutes remaining in our slot when we began, so each of

us only got a very few minutes in the left seat. Offsetting

that, however, as we queued up for our turn, the three or

four immediately behind the current victim were actually in

the box, behind the simulator cockpit section, in and around

the work station of the "dirty tricks guy", the simulator

operator. From that vantage we had a good view of the

displays and the panels for ten or twelve minutes before our

turn in the seat.

Captain Baille took the right seat, and handled the footwork,

as he said the pedals were "touchy". In reality, I'm sure he

knew that the aviation equivalent of rubbing your stomach

and patting your head would be quite enough, without also

expecting us to tap our feet at the same time.

Each of us in our turn got a chance to fly the simulated

Seahawk, pretty much as we wished, but for far too short a

time. Of course our range of experience was quite varied,

from a couple of private pilot license holders (fixed wing) to

"what's a helicopter'. Our host/instructor pilot subtly did

what he had to to make each of us look better than we were.

No one crashed, though the simulator operator did create a

mid-air collision with an AWACS, of all things, just so we

could see it. The screen(s) turned red and the display froze

for a moment before descending quite quickly to sea level

(the only frozen display I saw, and that was intentional -

more below).

My own turn started on a runway. I lifted off without incident,

climbed quickly to several hundred feet, did a standard rate

180, more or less, and began a descent to land again. I

really wanted to try a landing. Alas, I was still about thirty

seconds from touching down when my time ran out. The

descent looked OK, though of course would have been

impossibly steep for a fixed wing bird. I guess I'll never

know how it would have turned out.

I didn't embarrass myself too badly, though in the first minute

or so struggled with the control forces of the collective. I

commented on it and was tactfully shown a "trigger" on the

collective stick that allows you to momentarily release the

friction lock when making a control input. My grip was too

far back on the stick and I hadn't realized that the trigger was

there. Correcting that made all the difference. Now you

know why I don't play golf. Had I known it was there I probably

would not have pulled it anyway, as I'm sure pulling

unidentified trigger-like objects on military aircraft control

sticks can have unintended consequences.

The simulator cockpit, of course, is a very good simulation of

the real thing. The panels, instruments and controls are mainly

not glass, except those few that are in the real

aircraft. Most everything is a real component screwed into a

real panel. The window displays, seven in all including the

foot level one on each side, are a 3 dimensionally accurate

model of the actual cockpit windows. These are not just flat

planar displays set at angles, but are concave from the

operators perspective, just as in the real cockpit.

Surprisingly, the graphics were not what I'd expected. I'd

have to judge them as being on a par with FS98 or possibly

even an earlier version of MSFS. Objects were boxy,

without much detail and the display seemed to be about 8-

color. There were visible horizontal raster lines in the

display, though you soon became unaware of them. Having

noted that unexpectedly basic level of graphical detail,

however, there was a lot to offset it.

Recall that these displays are curved as the real windows

are, and of course the image projected in each has to be

coordinated. The graphics dynamics, if not the detail, was

stunning. I can't judge a frame rate, as there didn't seem to

be one. The image motion was never less than perfect;

smooth and coordinated, no matter what the ham-handed

non-rotorheads amongst us did. I never saw a lag, a

hesitation or a skip of any kind. The horizon, for instance,

regardless of the attitude, was always a dead-straight line

across whatever combination of window panels it cut through

at the moment. Add to that, all the flight instruments, which

were real instruments in a real panel, followed along

dutifully. The computer(s) behind this thing were driving a lot

more than seven oddly shaped monitors. This thing was

magnificent, and if there was a moment of disappointment in

the graphic detail, it disappeared very soon after things

started moving.

Instruments and controls are everywhere you can reach and

some places you can't. Between the seats is a raised panel

resembling a small refrigerator lying on its back. The top

surface is covered from end to end with switches and

controls of every description, including the radios, (they have

a lot more than I'm used to, UHF, VHF and some others) the

weapons panel and a number of the aircraft system sub-

panels. Of course the cyclic and collective each has its own

set of switches, knobs and buttons attached as well,

including that momentary friction lock override that I'd

recently become so painfully knowledgeable about.

The throttles are in the center overhead, along with the usual

assortment of overhead controls. I naively had expected a

twist grip on the collective for the throttle, but that's

apparently not how it's done these days, if ever it was. The

drill is to set the rotor speed desired with the throttle levers

and then let the governor try to keep it there as the pilot does

his thing with the collective and cyclic. Apparently there are

warnings for low rotor speed if the pilot's yanking is asking

for more than the turbines can provide, though I suspect he'd

have to be asking for a lot. This beast does not appear to be

underpowered.

We saw at least one simulator for the aircrew, a single

enlisted airman who rides in the back. He's referred to as

the Sensor Operator. His panel is also quite complex. He's

responsible for the sono-buoys, the MAD and a number of

other systems.

The simulators at HSL-40 operate every day from 0800 to

midnight. They are used in conjunction with a large

population of real Seahawks, at least two dozen that I saw,

and probably more that were out on training flights.

The rest of the day

Following our time in the simulator, our cameras and cell

phones were returned to us and we adjourned to the

maintenance hanger nearby. It was medium sized, with one

wall open facing the ramp, which was a busy, busy place.

There were about six Seahawks in the hangar and four of

those were being actively worked on. The work going on

appeared to be mainly inspections of one sort or another, as

opposed to repairs. (My career involved maintenance, and

I'm pretty tuned in to that sort of thing.) I saw no "hangar

rash", not a dent or scratch on any of the aircraft, though

they were obviously being heavily used and were not air

show clean.

We were not permitted to step out of the hangar onto the

ramp, as there were continuous flight operations and hot

refuelings in progress. Aside from that, we had not been

properly briefed in FOD procedures (foreign object debris, a

BIG DEAL) that were in strict effect beyond the hangar door

threshold, nor were we fitted with adequate hearing

protection. We did, however have a good view of everything

that was going on and the click of camera shutters was

almost as loud as the helicopters for a while.

After some time, Captain Baille tactfully dragged us kicking

and screaming from the hangar and we adjourned to a

sumptuous lunch at the base CPO club. CPOs are Chief

Petty Officers, the top three enlisted ranks in the Navy.

Their quarters on ships are referred to as the Goat Locker.

These are the guys who make the Navy run, and they run a

mean club. Captain Baille joined us for lunch, but it was

clear from his subdued demeanor that he'd never been in there before.

We got a peek at the ship basin as we drove by, which

brought back some memories. I'd spent a couple months at

Mayport in 1968, when my ship was there. Prominently

present among some smaller types was the aircraft carrier

John F. Kennedy, the Big John. One of the last two of the

Navy's non-nuclear carriers, she had just been formally

decommissioned within the last week and the breaking-up

process had begun. A sad, but necessary thing, I guess. I'd

seen her in Norfolk during my Navy time in the 60s, when

she was brand shining new.

And so, as the sun pulls away from the dock, and our ship

sinks slowly in the West - no, wait; wrong story. After lunch

we departed the base and went back to our separate lives. This

was a great experience, one I'll remember and cherish for

the rest of my life. It's always moving for me to see the

military up close; seeing some of what they do and some of

how they do it. These are good, dedicated people doing

serious things, and doing them well, mostly for not much

money. You didn't have to look very hard to see the sheen

of professionalism on most everything. I poked fun at the

base entry process, but security at military bases has

become serious business and I'm pleased they were treating

it as if it were. Whatever country each of us calls home, people

like those I saw at Mayport NS help make it possible

for all of us to sit home of an evening and fly our simulators

and chat on our forums in peace and security, and that's no

small thing. It's easily overlooked, but it's vital to us all.

I said I wanted to present this like a magazine article. It's

turned out more like a novelette. If you bore with me to this

point, I hope you enjoyed some of it. The photos are below,

and the captions, I hope, mercifully brief.

John

The photos

Captain Baille, Canadian Air Force

HSL-40 Squadron Insignia and one of the tools of the trade

Maintenance hangar. Note radar antenna beneath.

The upper works, un-shrouded

Turbine, transmission and rotorhead

Same stuff, different angle

Accessories group, hydraulic pumps, etc.

Even the ceiling lights even look like rotors

MAD sensor - this is deployed on a cable and towed behind

Feed me!

There are two birds stowed here; nearest one is only partially folded

Flight line

Taxiing

A few odds & ends lying around the hangar - obviously inert

Tail boom hinge - note the toothed steel dog clutch that connects

the drive shaft sections.

Radome removed

Arriving!

Tail feathers

Fully folded - rotor blades, elevators, tail boom

Turbine

Tail rotorhead, shroud removed

Main rotor head, folded. When restored, the two holes in the upper left

are engaged by the two pins with the small bar between them, upper right.

The front office

Some of the overhead panel is visible here

Safety wiring

Folded rotorhead. The door winch is in the foreground.

Sono-buoy dispenser, behind sensor operators seat

More flight line activity

Rotor tips are swept back in the last foot or so - noise reduction?

The Big John

The ship basin

[mutley 4,498]

:good

John,

Thanks for taking the considerable time to make this entertaining post, I really enjoyed being there it as much as you did. (I wasn't there tho' :nervious: )

I am so pleased you got to make the trip and by the look of it although a fixed wing fan you appeared to enjoy the day and take in all that was being shown to you, so the prize could not have gone to anyone more deserving.

Now you will have to pop over to Aerosoft and pick up the best Seahawk on the market http://www.aerosoft.com/cgi-local/us/ib ... 90,FS03223 and master that landing!

Regards,

[mark.hudson6 0]

:nervious: I'm very jealous. The pics of the inner workings of those whirly birds are spectacular. Thanks for sharing.

Cheers

Mark

[dgor 0]

I'm speechless.

That was a fantastic post John, really enjoyed reading it and the pictures are great. The flightline ones were particularly good I think.

Thank you very, very much for sharing these - makes me want to buy Aerosoft's Seahawk right now! *looks in wallet* :nervious:

Cheers, great post.

Dave :-)