CAE completes visual system upgrade of C-130J FFMS

CAE Australia has completed a comprehensive visual system upgrade for the Royal Australian Air Force's (RAAF) C-130J full-flight and mission simulator (FFMS) located at RAAF Base Richmond.

The simulator re-entered service ahead of schedule last month following minimal downtime and is now providing the RAAF with an enhanced and more realistic virtual environment to conduct flight and mission training.

The simulator is used in conjunction with training on real aircraft, providing a near seamless transition for students throughout their conversion to the C-130J Hercules.

"The new visual system offers significantly increased visual fidelity, including better colour, sharper imagery and improved brightness," said Squadron Leader Scott van Ginkel, C-130J Training Flight Commander for the RAAF's No. 285 Squadron.

"We conduct as much training as possible in simulation, because it is safe and cost-effective, and the C-130J simulator is our primary training aid for accomplishing this objective. The visual upgrade has delivered the improved realism required for military flying training, particularly low-level tactical operations and night vision goggles, so the RAAF now has a simulator that delivers enhanced operational mission training."

RAAF Commander Air Lift Group, Air Commodore Gary Martin, said that it was imperative for the Australian Defence Force to have the best quality of graduates from its six-month C-130J conversion course.

"There's a tremendous responsibility placed on our C-130J crews, who must be called upon to respond to short-notice and highly-complex tasks in Australia and abroad," Air Commodore Martin said.

"We therefore need the best possible training available to take an ab initio pilot and turn them in to a skilled C-130J operator."

The RAAF C-130J FFMS was upgraded with the latest generation CAE Medallion-6000 image generator as well as Liquid Crystal on Silicon (LCoS) high-resolution projectors and displays.

In addition, the RAAF C-130J FFMS now incorporates the CAE-developed common database (CDB) technology, which is an open database architecture that is rapidly updateable and enables correlated distributed mission training.