Ultra-Fast Reliable Radio Control Systems for Avionics

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - Project Racoon (Ultra-Fast Reliable Radio Control Systems for Avionics)

Berichtszeitraum: 2020-02-01 bis 2021-01-31

We have invented a way to make radio frequency communication reliable and low-latency to the point where it is good enough to replace hard-wiring in industrial and other control systems.

Hard-wiring has become a major obstacle to advances in automating both transport and industry. There are 550 kilometres of wires in an Airbus A380 plane: almost 7.5 tonnes of cabling which add to the plane’s fuel consumption each time it flies, cost airlines millions of euros in maintenance time, and complicates the aircraft retrofitting industry. Progress in factory automation is meanwhile hampered by the need to hard-wire control systems for assembly line robots and autonomous vehicles.

Until now, radio has not been reliable enough to use for aircraft controls or robotics, because signals can be blocked or interfered with. Wireless works fine for domestic WiFi but not for a safety-critical control system. Bluetooth, Zigbee etc are not fast or reliable enough to be used for such systems.

R3 is solving this issue. We have developed software which runs on commercial wireless chips and enables them to co-operate with each other, repeating each others’ transmissions. The result is a proprietary data transmission solution – “cooperative diversity” – that is 1,000x more reliable than anything achieved by our competitors. This solution, branded EchoRing, is already in commercial operation. But EchoRing has limits: when large numbers of transmitters are involved, its efficiency drops. We therefore propose an EIC Accelerator to take a second transmitter diversity architecture, codenamed RACOON – RAdio-COntrolled ONboard Systems for Avionics from TRL6 to TRL8. RACOON also uses diversity, but the architecture is fundamentally new –massively quicker, and more efficient.

RACOON, when developed, will be the only radio frequency control system in the world reliable enough to use in the €61bn avionics sector. Replacing wiring in planes will save millions of tonnes of emissions per year, and millions of euros in reduced fuel and maintenance costs. Our strategic focus is to build a software solution for a European aircraft manufacturing giant, which has commissioned a Proof-of-Concept from us for use in wireless control of the complex cabin lighting systems for future low-emissions aircraft; and simultaneously to extend such control systems to other aviation businesses who seek wireless alternatives to hard-wiring today. These other customers will buy both pre-configured hardware and software from R3 and potentially its hardware partners; and include cabin-fitting suppliers, avionics equipment manufacturers, and players in the booming retro-fitting and maintenance sector.

The results of this project will then be applied to the much larger industrial automation sector, “unwiring” control systems from robots to cranes, from human-machine interfaces to fully automated assembly lines. Here we already have software license relationships with robotic companies, car and control systems makers; and have software supply deals with wireless solutions provider WebTech, electronic components distributor Arrow, and IoT experts Olympus Sky.

Within the first half of the project, we have made significant advances in all WPs. The main results are summarized in the following:

We have designed and implemented the new architecture and protocols of our EchoRing approach allowing for better scalability and lower latencies. The new architecture is based on Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA). The basic implementation is functioning and runs on our hardware. In addition to the new architecture, we are porting and adapting the channel acquisition scheme from our existing decentralized EchoRing architecture. Furthermore, we have started to implement the runtime optimized cooperation algorithms.

On the transceiver side we have successfully designed and implemented a first prototype, which is capable of communicating in the WAIC (Wireless Avionics Intra-Communications) frequency bands currently under standardization for usage for safety-critical wireless in-cabin communication. We have successfully demonstrated that communication with this transceiver is possible in these frequency bands.

On the business side, we have been able to intensify our contacts to partners and suppliers in the avionics sector despite the COVID 19 pandemic. We attended the LuFo info days of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy – a matchmaking event for the upcoming federal funding opportunities in Germany. Here we could intensify old contacts and make many new ones. Furthermore, the kick-off meeting for the company certification process in ISO 9001 / EN9100 has taken place.

For safety critical applications our TDMA based technology is still the only approach capable of operating in the WAIC frequency bands when it comes to broadband wireless communication which is capable of reliable real-time communication.
We still expect a big socio-economic impact especially with the potential reduction of emissions due to the reduced required cabling (and resulting weight reduction) in airplanes.

Prototype of the Racoon 4.3 Ghz WAIC band transceiver

Frame structure of the new Racoon TDMA frames

Comparing failure performance between a WAIC system without and with one retransmission (repetition)

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - Project Racoon (Ultra-Fast Reliable Radio Control Systems for Avionics)

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