Gentex (United States)

Gentex Corporation is nearing completion of the developmental and operational test phase of the Helmet Mounted Integrated Targeting (HMIT) contract with the Air National Guard and Air Force Reserve. The HMIT program involves qualification and installation of the Scorpion Helmet Mounted Cueing System (HMCS) Color Helmet Mounted Display (HMD) in both the A-10C and F-16C Block 30 aircraft. This paper discusses the program status and results.

Pilots identified an off-boresight cueing capability as one of the most urgently needed upgrades to the A-10C Weapon System. The currently fielded JHMCS appeared cost prohibitive, driving the need for a new solution that could provide day/night cueing capabilities. Gentex Visionix and Lockheed Martin Systems Integration initiated an accelerated development program that delivered an affordable system (Scorpion HMCS) to the Air Force for flight test, within a twelve month period. In addition to providing the required cueing capabilities, this new system displays color symbology and sensor video. Operational Utility Evaluation flight tests were performed on an A-10C aircraft by the ANG and AFRC Test Center.

The practical boundaries surrounding the design of very high resolution image sensors have been studied. The case study used to analyze these practical boundaries is a CMOS photodiode active pixel sensor (APS) image sensor with pixel array format of 3,072 (H) X 2,048 (V). The frame rate of the image sensor is variable up to 30 frames per second (fps), leading to a maximum image data throughput of 180 M pixels per second. The pixel size is 6.0 μm, resulting in a pixel fill factor of approximately 48% (implemented in a 0.25 μm CMOS fabrication process) and a 4/3 inch optical format. The resultant die fill factor is approximately 54%. The column-parallel approach, which works well for both the on-chip analog signal processing and analog-to-digital conversion, is adopted. The 10-bit successive approximation ADC was deemed suitable for on-chip integration. The projected total power consumption of the case study image sensor chip is below 200 mW at 3.3-V power supply and below 100 mW at 1.5-V power supply. These power estimates were made for operation at full resolution (6 M pixels per frame) and at maximum frame rate (30 fps), leading to a maximum digital image data throughput of 1.8 G bits per second.