 |
BAE Systems: Border Patrol System Design Fall 2005, ED&G 100 Design Project |
|---|---|
| ED&G 100: Introduction to Engineering Design
The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802 Fall 2005
|
|
|
|
BAE Systems: Border Patrol System Design Fall 2005, ED&G 100 Design Project |
|---|---|
| ED&G 100: Introduction to Engineering Design
The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802 Fall 2005
|
|
F.A.Q.
Direct your specific questions on this project to Prof.
Sven G. Bilén (sbilen@psu.edu)
who will relay your question, if appropriate, to our contacts on this project.
Please provide as much detail as possible in your question so we can understand
why you are asking it. It is
important that we respect the communication channel that they provide to
us. Prof. Bilén
will attempt to have answers to questions within
24 hours, when possible. Note: asking a question via this method is not a
replacement for doing your own research. A lot of questions can be answered by
doing your own library research, web search, etc. Thanks for your cooperation.
Under no circumstances are you to contact BAE Systems directly. All information requests are to be made only through Prof. Bilén (sbilen@psu.edu). If it is determined that a student or team has circumvented this process, their name(s) will be forwarded to their instructor who will deal with the infraction appropriately.
Q: Are we supposed to consider the "power plant" onboard the UAV?
A: You only need to consider prime power to run the instruments from batteries and not the propulsion system.
| Return to Top |
Q: What facilities are we to assume are available, e.g., landing strips?
A: The terrain is a general terrain model, and not specific to a certain border. You need to make an assumption about what types of facilities are available or show how to provide them.
| Return to Top |
Q: What is the overall total size of the area to be under surveillance?
A: Assume a strip 1 km wide and 100 km long.
| Return to Top |
Q: What is the maximum cost of the system?
A: Although there is no cost cap, you must be able to justify costs. Costs for operation of the system should be included.
| Return to Top |
Q: Who will be buying this system?
A: This could be any of a number of governments, municipalities, and/or private companies.
| Return to Top |
Q: Are the flight controls to be completely autonomous or include a human pilot in the loop?
A: This will depend on your CONOPS and chosen systems.
| Return to Top |
Q: Do we need to worry about weather conditions?
A: You may assume you have an average "good" day, although the more able your system is to operate in all types of weather, the more reliable and versatile it will be.
| Return to Top |
Q: Is the UAV supposed to be invisible?
A: Not necessarily. This will depend on your CONOPS.
| Return to Top |
Q: Are we limited to chosing only BAE products for our system?
A: No.
| Return to Top |
Q: Does the target need to be stopped within the 1 km?
A: You are only required to detect and track, not interdict.
| Return to Top |
Q: Are there any no-fly zones?
A: This depends what border you are monitoring. You should assume that you may not enter the airspace of the other side of the border.
| Return to Top |
Q: How wide is the body of water in the general terrain model?
A: Assume it is the width of the strip, i.e., 1 km.
| Return to Top |
Q: Do we have to find intruders who are underground or underwater?
A: You may assume all intrudes are above ground or on the water..
| Return to Top |
Q: Do you have any estimates of what it costs to patrol the border now?
A: No.
| Return to Top |
Q: Are we limited to a single platform, i.e., airborne or on the ground?
A: No, you may be mixed mode. This will depend on your CONOPS.
| Return to Top |
Q: Can we make the proposed system customizable depending on the mission?
A: Yes.
| Return to Top |
Q: Do we need our system to differentiate between the good and the bad guys?
A: No.
| Return to Top |
Q: The slides mention GTO weight for the different UAVs. What is that?
A: GTO stands for "Gross Take-Off," so GTO weight is how heavy in total the UAV is when taking off. The number includes plane, fuel, and payload.
| Return to Top |
Q: Can the chemical imaging sensor when programmed to detect specific wavelengths and frequencies emitted by humans, penetrate the forest from a 2-km altitude position (assuming the distance between the platform and the bottom of the forest is within the 3.5-km range) that is either above or not directly above the forest?
A: The chemical sensor is capable of sensing the signature of humans in the presence of the forest.
| Return to Top |
Q: Can scanning radar (of either ranges) penetrate the forest either from an angle or directly above the forest?
A: The scanning radar provided will likely not be able to resolve the target in the presence of the forest at the minimum range stated. A more sophisticated radar/algorithm using a pulse compression technique could possibly work in the presence of forest clutter however even the 3.5 km range stated is likely not enough distance to work with so it would still be tough. If one really wanted the radar approach to work in the forest, one would have to work at the higher altitudes and add a pulse compression algorithm which rapidly becomes very complex (and expensive). This leads to another trade though in terms of field of view so the students will have to be careful.
| Return to Top |
Q: If I understand it correctly, the land belongs to neither country. Are there restrictions on what we are allowed to build in the border region? Should strips for UAV's be on our side of the border? Are we allowed to clear areas of the forest?
A: It is not so much that the land belong to neither country, only that it is not extremely important which countries. But, strips for UAVs should be on "your" side. I would make an assumption that you can get a landing strip, and there is no need to clear forest.
| Return to Top |
Q: There is some confusion within our group about the sample border. We've been provided with a sample border but were also told that our system should be adaptable. Are we to design a system specifically for the provided border that could be altered to work on other borders? Or are we to design a system that will work on any border using the sample border as a guide?
A: The sample border is just that, a sample showing all the different types of terrain that might be encountered on a real border. So, you must be able to accomplish the mission on the given sample border, with the assumption that for another border things could be reconfigured to have more forest or lake or mountain, etc.
| Return to Top |
Q: In regards to sensors, what is the "angular resolution" that is referred to?
A: What angular resolution refers to is to what resolution you can place something in space with the sensor. For example, say your sensor has a 1-degree angular resolution. This means that you can place an object within that angle, so overall placement determination in linear space will depend on distance from the sensor.
| Return to Top |
Q: My team is having trouble finding reliable prices of UAVs. For many we can't find any prices and for some we have found different prices at different websites. BAE didn't give us a specific budget but said that the Global Hawk was a bit much. Can we get a list of UAVs and costs or should we ignore cost or just use the best information we can find?
A: Buying a UAV is not like buying a consumer product, so pricing info is not as easy to come by and also depends heavily on configuration (it's more like buying a car where price depends on what options you want). A fairly exhaustive search on the internet did not turn up such a list. However, the costs of some UAV platforms can be estimated, a process that engineers use extensively when exact information cannot be had. Here is a suggestion on how to make an estimate of cost. In the intro slide package provided by BAE, slide 9 give the approximate price of 4 different UAVs. So, these can be used to estimate the costs of other UAVs by comparing features and capabilities and then assuming price will be similar. Indeed, a costing model posted on the internet found a fairly linear relationship between several metrics for evaluating UAV performance and cost. This relationship may hence be used to estimate costs of UAVs.
| Return to Top |
Q: Are we to choose an existing UAV prototype or do we design a whole new one?
A: It is probably best if you choose and existing UAV design, otherwise you would need to include the NRE (non recurring engineering) costs in your total system cost.
| Return to Top |
Q: Is the acoustic microphone listed in the page of sensors able to detect noise under water?
A: No. That particular microphone is not
suitable to that task. For that you would need a hydrophone or array of
hydrophones for which no data has been supplied. It is a clever thought though.
One question I would have is how will you communicate the data form the array to
the base station? I can think of a couple of ways, it would depend on your
system CONOPS. A little research on the web may shed more light on the topic. I
suggest you peek at the following web sites: (There are many, many more, depends
on how deep you want to dive in).
http://oceanexplorer.noaa.gov/explorations/sound01/background/technology/technology.html
http://www.physorg.com/news4183.html
| Return to Top |
Q: TBD
A: TBD.
| Return to Top |
Q: TBD
A: TBD.
| Return to Top |
More questions and answers will be added soon...
Go to: ED&G100 Home
| Design Project Resource
Go to: Penn State Home
| College of Engineering
| ED&G
Project inquiries: Sven G. Bilén,
sbilen@psu.edu
Last revised on
26 November 2005.
