Navy Mudbucket Surrogate Aircraft Controller/Monitor

The Navy Mudbucket Phase II CPP will accelerate the transition of the innovative embedded-signal-manipulation technology developed under Army SBIR A06-086 to a flight-capable and autonomous-control-enabling product for NAVAIR. Building on the proven MIL-STD-1553 transparent overdrive technology and open-standards control and monitoring interface proven in the Army SBIR, the Navy Mudbucket Phase II CPP will add a Linear Variable Differential Transformer (LVDT) embedded signal overdrive capability and a software service based architecture. The Navy Mudbucket CPP will culminate in F-18 cruise flight and Autonomous Aerial Refueling (AAR) tests in which control of the aircraft will be applied through the Mudbucket. In addition to providing an unmatched surrogate test platform for PMA-268, the completed Navy Mudbucket will be able to be used in a variety of military and commercial test and operational applications where it is desirable to remotely or autonomously control aircraft.