Wireless-based aircraft data communication system with automatic frequency control

A system for providing a retrievable record of the flight performance of an aircraft comprising:

• a plurality of sensors located throughout the aircraft for sensing routine aircraft conditions and generating parametric data such as received by a flight data recorder representative of the aircraft flight performance during flight of the aircraft;
• a global positioning system on board the aircraft for generating position data reflective of the latitude and longitude of the aircraft;
• a multiplexer connected to the plurality of sensors and global positioning system for receiving the parametric data and position data and multiplexing the parametric data and position data determined by the global positioning system;
• a ground data link unit connected to said multiplexer for receiving and multiplexing a sample of the multiplexed stream of parametric data and position data determined by the global positioning system, said ground data link unit comprising:
• a) an archival data store operative to accumulate and store flight performance data during flight of the aircraft, and
• b) a spread spectrum transceiver coupled to said archival data store, and comprising a transmitter that is operative after the aircraft completes its flight and lands at an airport to download said flight performance data that has been accumulated and stored by said archival data store during flight over one of a plurality of sub-band frequency channels of a spread spectrum communication signal, wherein said sub-band frequency channel is chosen based on a position of the aircraft determined by the on board global positioning system in order to comply with any regulatory frequency requirements of the geographical area in which the aircraft has landed;
• and
• an airport based spread spectrum receiver that receives the spread spectrum communication signal from the aircraft and demodulates the signal to obtain the flight performance data.

A system for exchanging information to and from an aircraft comprising:

• a ground data link unit that obtains flight performance data representative of aircraft flight performance during flight of the aircraft, said ground data link unit comprising:
• a) an archival data store operative to accumulate and store flight performance data during flight of the aircraft, and
• b) a spread spectrum transceiver coupled to said archival data store, and comprising a transmitter that is operative after the aircraft completes its flight and lands at an airport to download said flight performance data that has been accumulated and stored by said archival data store during flight over one of a plurality of sub-band frequency channels of a spread spectrum communication signal, wherein said sub-band frequency channel is chosen based on a position of the aircraft determined by an on board global positioning system in order to comply with any regulatory frequency requirements of the geographical area in which the aircraft has landed, and a receiver for receiving uploaded data over a second spread spectrum communication signal;
• and
• an airport based spread spectrum transceiver comprising a receiver that receives the spread spectrum communication signal from the aircraft and demodulates the signal to obtain the flight performance data, and a transmitter that transmits data for uploading to the aircraft over a second spread spectrum communication signal.

A method of providing a retrievable record of the flight performance of an aircraft comprising the steps of:

• collecting data within a ground data link unit on the flight performance of the aircraft during flight of the aircraft;
• accumulating and storing within an archival memory of the ground data link unit the flight performance data during flight of the aircraft;
• determining the position of the aircraft based on a global positioning system situated on the aircraft;
• after the aircraft lands at an airport at completion of the flight, selecting a sub-band frequency channel based on the determined position of the aircraft to comply with any regulatory frequency requirements of the geographical area in which the aircraft has landed;
• downloading the flight performance data that has been accumulated and stored during the flight over the selected sub-band frequency channel of a spread spectrum communication signal to an airport based spread spectrum receiver;
• and
• demodulating within the receiver the received spread spectrum signal to obtain the flight performance data.