Control apparatus
AssigneeBritish Aerospace Public Limited Company
InventorNeil J. Curtis
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Control apparatus for effecting control of thrust magnitude and thrust vector angle for aircraft of the short take-off and vertical landing type known by the acronym STOVL comprises a fixed housing (10), a manually movable stick member (7) supported with respect to the fixed housing (10) and arranged to provide a throttle input, the stick member (7) including a grip (8) to enable it to be gripped and moved manually relative to the fixed housing (10), and a rotatable collar (9) arranged to provide the thrust vector angle input. Preferably the grip includes an upright hand-datum flange (13) for positively laterally locating a controlling hand and the hand-datum flange (13) is located at one extremity of the grip (8) and the collar (9) is located at the other extremity of the grip (8).
Claims16
A control apparatus for an aircraft of the vectored thrust type arranged to produce control signals in response to control movements, including:
- a fixed housing;
- a manually movable stick member supported with respect to said fixed housing and arranged to provide a first control signal corresponding to thrust magnitude demand, said thrust magnitude demand being determined by the location of said stick member with respect to said housing;
- said stick member including a grip to enable it to be gripped and moved manually with respect to said fixed housing so as to vary said thrust magnitude demand;
- and
- a rotatable collar mounted on said grip and arranged to provide a second control signal corresponding to thrust vector angle demand, said thrust vector angle demand being determined by an angular orientation of said collar.
A control apparatus for a vectored thrust aircraft arranged to produce a thrust magnitude demand signal and a thrust vector angle demand signal in response to control movements, said apparatus including:
- a fixed housing;
- a manually movable stick member supported with respect to said fixed housing, the attitude of said manually movable stick member remaining substantially constant with respect to a pilot throughout its range of movement, said thrust magnitude demand signal being provided by the location of said stick member with respect to said fixed housing;
- said stick member including a grip to enable it to be gripped and moved manually relative to said fixed housing;
- a rotatable collar mounted on said grip, said thrust vector angle demand signal being provided by the angular orientation of said collar;
- and
- an upright hand-datum flange located on said grip for positively laterally locating a controlling hand with respect to said rotatable collar, said hand-datum flange being located at one extremity of said grip and said collar being located at the other extremity of said grip.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.