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Commander NORRINGTON. We specified 20 hertz.

Senator GOLDWATER. Do you think you can eliminate those problems? Commander NORRINGTON. We are trying awfully hard. We are spending a good piece of change on the aviation wide-angle-visual system which is not just a visual system, of course, but is also a motion platform, flying qualities, tactile, anything you can mention that relates to actually specifying. That is a tech base development program, and we think that the information we are getting out of the aviation wide-angle-visual system has already helped us in the drafting of several specifications, the first of which was the air combat maneuvering simulator.

A-6E WST

Senator GOLDWATER. In denying the request for fiscal 1977 funds to procure an A-6E weapon system trainer for the Marines, the House Appropriations Committee recommended that the Navy consider instead, modifying the A-6A simulator at Cherry Point.

What action has been taken to meet the Marine Corps A-6E training requirement?

Commander NORRINGTON. That trainer requirements is a very real one indeed. The A-6E itself is going to be around at least through the 1980's. I should say. The Navy is about to authorize modification of the A-6A weapons systems trainer at Cherry Point to an A-6E configuration, and it is our initial assessment that over the procurement cost of a new weapon system trainer, this update will save us about $11 or $12 million. It is analogous to conversion in lieu of a procurement program.

Senator GOLDWATER. How long is the A-6 system going to be around?

Commander NORRINGTON. A-6 aircraft?

Senator GOLDWATER. Yes.

Commander NORRINGTON. I believe it is going to be in the inventory into the nineties, through the eighties.

Senator GOLDWATER. Through the eighties?

Commander NORRINGTON. Yes, sir, into the nineties.

Senator GOLDWATER. That is all for the Navy.

Commander NORRINGTON. Thank you, sir.

Senator GOLDWATER. Now, we get around to the Army.

ARMY PRESENTATION

Ms. DAVIS. Let me introduce Lt. Col. Ralph Lauder from the Army. Senator.

Senator GOLDWATER. The Army being last doesn't indicate any feeling on our part at all.

Colonel LAUDER. I was the youngest, sir.

Senator GOLDWATER. I was a second lieutenant in the Army in 1930.

STATEMENT OF LT. COL. RALPH H. LAUDER, U.S. ARMY, SYSTEM
COORDINATOR, DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF (RESEARCH, DEVELOP
MENT AND ACQUISITION)

Colonel LAUDER. I brought with me my colleagues, Lt. Col. Robert
Shain, Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations, and Lt. Col. Truman
Maynard.

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The last 6 years have marked a dramatic increase in the Army simulator program. In 1972 the Army completed development of the UH-1 flight simulator also referred to in those days as the 2-B-24. It was the first Army helicopter simulator with a sophisticated motion base. It did not have a visual system. The impact of this device has been dramatic.

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Initially the Army had an instrument procedures trainer, the Blue Canoe. Students spent 26 hours in that simulator and about 60 hours in the aircraft for instrument training. Their total was 210 hours flight time.

With the UH-1 simulator, students initially trained in it for 71⁄2 hours and 4211⁄2 hours in aircraft instrument training, but over time we have gone to 40 hours in the UH-1 simulator and 20 hours in the airplane. This is only for instrument training. The students spend 155 hours in the visual environment flying helicopters. We now fly the helicopters 175 hours during initial training.

The same thing has happened in the field. Our annual instrument training requirement used to be 20 hours in the aircraft. Initially when we put the UH-1 simulator in the field, aviators flew 10 hours in the simulators and 15 hours in the airplane for instrument training. It was so good that now the Army is up to 25 hours in the simulator in the field. These hours are based not only on cost avoidance but, most important the impact is that we can train better.

SIMULATOR HOURS PRIOR TO SOLO

Senator GOLDWATER. Let me ask you a question on that.

I have flown the simulators down at Fort Rucker and I am very impressed with them. How many hours does a man have to spend in a simulator before he is ready to go out with an IP for his first check! Colonel LAUDER. As far as the official position, I don't really know. Senator GOLDWATER. Let's go back a way. Before we had the simulators, how long did it take you to solo a man in a helicopter?

Colonel LAUDER. I don't want to use myself as typical. Whenever I went through I think I had about 6 or 7 hours in the helicopter, but I came out of fixed wing into helicopters. I have talked to people, for example, a young officer out at Davison Army Air Field, and he said whenever he went through transition, he went into the simulator and did everything in the simulator. He had never flown the UH-1 helicopter. He got all his training in the simulator, then for his instrument check ride the IP did the instrument takeoff and he took it over and flew the check ride. He was part of an experimental group. The first time he flew the airplane, it was on his instrument check ride. I don't think that is typical but an experiment. I just don't have answers to those questions, but I could provide them, sir.

Senator GOLDWATER. It would be interesting to find out. I know when I took my helicopter training it took me about 10 hours to get used to the idea that the stick was a stick. Once you get over that it is all right. I had the feeling flying that simulator that you could almost send a man out and let him fly that helicopter.

Colonel LAUDER. Well, I think the Army believes generally the same thing. Well, we will find out those figures for you. Senator GOLDWATER. It would be interesting. Colonel LAUDER. I will provide them to you. [The information follows:]

HELICOPTER TRAINING

The student normally solos after the first 15 hours of dual flight instruction conducted in the TH-55 helicopter in the Primary Flight Phase. The state-ofthe-art of the current UH-1 Flight Simulator (UH-1 FS) will not facilitate in

struction in a visual mode but is used extensively in conjunction with instrument instruction. The student spends approximately 9.0 hours in the UH-1 FS with an instructor pilot prior to the basic instrument check ride which is one hour in duration for a total of 10.0 hours in the UH-1 FS. Subsequently, the student receives an additional 25 UH-1 FS hours and 17.5 hours in the UH-1 aircraft prior to receiving his advanced instrument check ride which is 2.5 hours in duration. The following is a complete breakout of the phases of the 175/40 Initial Entry Rotary Wing Course:

[blocks in formation]

1 For approximately 10 U.S. Army students per class in lieu of the 60 hours in the UH-1H.

5 UH-1FS 160 OH-58

Colonel LAUDER. These increases in usage typify Army policy, which also is very similar to the DOD policy, to make optimum use of the flight simulators, where practical, to increase our training effectiveness, but not at the expense of combat effectiveness.

Finally, as I stated, the Army has developed instrument simulators, but we operate in an intensely visual environment. We are down low in the trees. This gives you a little history of our flight simulator development.

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We have the old Blue Canoe, which is a procedure simulator with no visual. We developed the UH-1 simulator also without a visual scene, but we can now do realistic instrument training. This simulator has dynamic motion.

We have the CH-47 simulator using a terrain model board. Along with instruments, we have added the visual aspect which we did not have before.

We are developing the AH-1 or Cobra simulator, which adds gunnery, not available before.

The next one is the UH-60 simulator formerly called the UTTAS, or the Black Hawk. This time we are going to have incoming hostile fire. Since Black Hawk is not armed except for door guns, we don't have the gunnery aspect of training.

The last one is AH-64, which will have a wrap-around computer image generated visual scene. We will have a combat mission simulator with hostile fire, gunnery, visual, and instrument flight.

To give a little more appreciation for what I refer to as this intensely visual environment, I have a short film I would like to present. The film shows some scenes out of an actual aircraft and out of our simulators.

[Film narration.]

Colonel LAUDER. This is up in the Fort Lewis, Wash. area. This is the UH-1 helicopter. The film is taken out of the front, and you can see he is down here in the trees, and that is the Army environment. We are going up a riverbed. I would like you to note it is a riverbed because you are going to see it again in another minute or so, with a simulator flying down through a little gully. This is a Cobra firing a TOW missile and was taken from behind the helicopter. You can see the missile on the way downrange. Now we have impact.

This is our Cobra simulator. This is the front and aft of the cockpit. You see they are on a separate motion bases. This will give you some idea of the gyrations we go through. The Army does feel motion is required because of the disturbance and maneuver type cues. This is a picture of the model board. Here you can see the probe as it flies across the terrain, in response to the pilots control movements.

Senator GOLDWATER. Can you change the focal length of that in flight?

Colonel LAUDER. This probe employs a Scheinpflug correction which, under computer control, varies the plane of best focus to coincide with the terrain in view. It is an infinity type display. This could be a pilot planning his mission for the simulator on the actual map of the area. This is a camera model board visual system of Cobra. Here is another river. It doesn't happen to be one at Fort Lewis, but you can see the similarity with the visual cues that we saw with the actual airplane.

This is the TOW firing. These two dark objects here are tanks. We have got the IR source and where it is headed. This is not from the gunner's view. The gunner sees an entirely different picture. This is taken from the pilot's viewpoint.

We have another TOW missile on the way to the target. It is going to the tank all the way on the right. That was a hit. You noticed the blink. The third one coming out is a miss and it just sort of fades off in the distance.

[Erd of film.]

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