Boeing's Ferguson on Starliner - no touch screens, but far simpler than Shuttle

[Chris Bergin]

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2018/08/boeing-starliner-crew-spacecraft/

By Chris Gebhardt

[Patchouli]

I think Boeing's approach to a user interface for avionics makes more sense.

[TrevorMonty]

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2018/08/boeing-starliner-crew-spacecraft/

By Chris Gebhardt

I think Boeing's approach to a user interface for avionics makes more sense.

Boeing have lot experience to draw one from all aircraft they've designed.

[kevinof]

I wonder how many of those buttons actually get used on a normal flight? My guess is (unless there is very little automation on the starliner) very very few.

[envy887]

I think Boeing's approach to a user interface for avionics makes more sense.

Both are using glass to display virtually all information and to present menus to navigate to, and reserving hard buttons/switches for critical functions.

The only apparent difference (that I see, anyway) is Boeing uses hard buttons (instead of touch) for navigating the display menus, and they have perhaps twice as many switches/buttons for critical functions. I'm sure there are also differences in the way information is displayed and menus are navigated, but we don't know about those yet.

[envy887]

I wonder how many of those buttons actually get used on a normal flight? My guess is (unless there is very little automation on the starliner) very very few.

From the article:

By definition and per the requirements for the Commercial Crew Program, Starliner is perfectly capable of flying itself without any input from a crew up to the International Space Station and docking itself to the lab.

[zodiacchris]

I think there are many ways to skin a cat, and the Starliner controls look a fair bit like the cockpit of my aircraft, which I designed. That said, I‘m writing this on a touch screen, so why not avoid the Boeing versus SpaceX angle in this thread? 🤔

[Coastal Ron]

The competition of ideas is a good thing, and we have to remember that reusable spacecraft of this type is a new thing (Shuttle was a different age/class), so no one really has good experience to draw from.

It will likely take a couple of generations of this type of vehicle before we'll know for sure what type of approach (which may not be either of these two) works best.

[fthomassy]

I wonder how many of those buttons actually get used on a normal flight? My guess is (unless there is very little automation on the starliner) very very few.

"No touch screens" ... so I imagine the buttons, switches and dials may be used quite a lot to get information.

[TripleSeven]

https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2018/08/boeing-starliner-crew-spacecraft/

By Chris Gebhardt

this is an excellent article...thanks for pubbing it

[TripleSeven]

I think Boeing's approach to a user interface for avionics makes more sense.

Both are using glass to display virtually all information and to present menus to navigate to, and reserving hard buttons/switches for critical functions.

The only apparent difference (that I see, anyway) is Boeing uses hard buttons (instead of touch) for navigating the display menus, and they have perhaps twice as many switches/buttons for critical functions. I'm sure there are also differences in the way information is displayed and menus are navigated, but we don't know about those yet.

this is very very typical Boeing...if you look at the progression of screen displays and automation in their airplanes...this goes along that time line.  the first airplane that Boeing dabbled in with "screens" was the B737....they worked real hard in the demonstrator to try and figure out how to minimize errors and time in terms of getting to displays and getting information from them. 

not even in the Dreamliner do you navigate to pages by touch screen...as its hard to "muscle memory" touch screens and insure non error without visual checking.  in the triple all the screens are controlled by "hard switches" which I can go to with my "hand" without looking...and since no one is wearing space suits...the feel of the switches confirms this

at least "I" can see in the controls the Boeing legacy of the autopilot flight direction System (AFDS) controls that have been in Boeings since the 300 series was "screened".  boeing has played around with a touch screen version of the AFDS but even "younger pilots" who have grown up on touch screens do not like it...and it goes against every thing that flight safety dictates.

Boeing will never build a vehicle that carries people where there is not the ability for "someone" on the vehicle to monitor the operation of the vehicle and step in and "interact" with the automation.  thats just not in their DNA...

I'll be curious to see which "works"  my guess is that the CST 100 is going to have in some form or fashion a very very long life...and will be extremely versatile...

[TripleSeven]

I wonder how many of those buttons actually get used on a normal flight? My guess is (unless there is very little automation on the starliner) very very few.

"today" we did a run in the triple up to the UK and after takeoff...the airplane completely flew itself all the way to touchdown and roll out...it was a demonstration of performance based navigation (ie Using GPS ) to both navigation, and shoot a CAT IIIB landing without using the ILS systems at Heathrow.

Regulatory authorities from the Turkish DGCA, the FAA and EASA were on the flight to monitor the performance of the equipment...

at 400 feet after takeoff I engaged the autopilot...but I used the buttons to "monitor" the performance of the automatic systems just like I normally do.  those buttons will see a lot of use.

[ThereIWas3]

A difference with most spacecraft is that you generally do not operate them by looking out the window.  So your attention is entirely on the instrument panel and you do not have to "feel" for the buttons.  And since the launch sequence is entirely automated (even for Boeing), there is no need to be able to hit the right switch while the engines are running, other than the big abort handle.

In Apollo the systems were not very automated at all, so they had to count on Al Bean knowing where that "SCE" switch was located and be able to flip it while under thrust.   These days, such things would be automated anyway.

[TripleSeven]

A difference with most spacecraft is that you generally do not operate them by looking out the window.  So your attention is entirely on the instrument panel and you do not have to "feel" for the buttons.  And since the launch sequence is entirely automated (even for Boeing), there is no need to be able to hit the right switch while the engines are running, other than the big abort handle.

In Apollo the systems were not very automated at all, so they had to count on Al Bean knowing where that "SCE" switch was located and be able to flip it while under thrust.   These days, such things would be automated anyway.

my view (having not flown in space ) is that the first "graph"  will not be proven correct.

I dont know a launch sequence that has not been automated.  the Shuttle launch sequence was pretty automated...so was Apollo, Gemini and Mercury...there was no ability of the "pilots" to fly the rocket had the autopilot failed...the only question was as you put it "the abort switch"  . SCE to Aux is a "configuration" change...the equivalent switch in all Boeing aircraft (yes there is something like that) is not automated...

how much looking out the window will be done depends on what is being done.  docking/berthing aside ...looking out the window proved very useful in the shuttle and if the Starliner evolves into where I think the company wants to take it, given some funding source it will be very useful in the future.  I think that the STarliner will have a very long career and will evolve to do a lot of things, as the future unfolds.  Boeing certainly has plans for that

Starliner could easily evolve into an affordable Apollo system...

most of the time "I" am looking at the various screens in my airplane...and feel for the switches is a big deal...we teach that in training and how Boeing has designed the "shape of things" is to reinforce the feel

for all I know Musk has come onto the new thing with his touch screens...he is unique no airplane, nuclear control systems, oil field control (ie rigs off shore) or nuclear submarine...is using them...

[joek]

for all I know Musk has come onto the new thing with his touch screens...he is unique no airplane, nuclear control systems, oil field control (ie rigs off shore) or nuclear submarine...is using them...

On the other hand, as Ferguson said...

... But I’m inclined to think that further down the road it’ll be like Avis Rent-A-Car. You just get in, you don’t have the owner’s manual, and you drive. ...

Quite a lot of experience to draw from that sector (among others).  Not really a new or unique thing these days.

[Negan]

for all I know Musk has come onto the new thing with his touch screens...he is unique no airplane, nuclear control systems, oil field control (ie rigs off shore) or nuclear submarine...is using them...

Doesn't the F-35 use touch screens?

[TripleSeven]

"On the other hand, as Ferguson said...

... But I’m inclined to think that further down the road it’ll be like Avis Rent-A-Car. You just get in, you don’t have the owner’s manual, and you drive. ..."


you missed most of the quote I'll help

"“So I think there’s going to be a pretty steep learning curve, and the initial crews will really have to learn every facet of it.  But I’m inclined to think that further down the road it’ll be like Avis Rent-A-Car. You just get in, you don’t have the owner’s manual, and you drive.

“We’d love to get to that point.  It will never be that easy. But it will be several orders of magnitude better in terms of intensity than Shuttle.”

a few years ago we were in San Fran...when the purser told me that there was a passenger who wanted to ask a question.  I like talking with the yolcu...so I went to the seat in business...and the guy told me that he had seen me do the walkaround but that he had done a lot of preflights onthe triple on microsoft flight simulator...and it was not required to do an inspection of the "drive" door...I told him in very kind words that it was 1) my airlines procedure and 2) Boeing's procedure and 3) I had been a test pilot on the triple with Boeing.

He was kind and said "I have never done a walk around on a real Triple Seven" and my reply was "Fortunately for all of us, I have. many many many times. SAfe flights"

Starliner is going to be an amazing vehicle...it will always have a pilot

[TripleSeven]

for all I know Musk has come onto the new thing with his touch screens...he is unique no airplane, nuclear control systems, oil field control (ie rigs off shore) or nuclear submarine...is using them...

Doesn't the F-35 use touch screens?

yeah and it also has the super helmet neither of which work well

[joek]

He was kind and said "I have never done a walk around on a real Triple Seven" and my reply was "Fortunately for all of us, I have. many many many times. SAfe flights"

Starliner is going to be an amazing vehicle...it will always have a pilot

So now we need a pre-launch walk-around of the LV & SC?  Leave it behind; does not apply.  Yes, these SC will always have a "pilot" because someone has to be in command and ultimately responsible.  Don't conflate that responsibility with the actions you perform piloting an aircraft.  These are not aircraft, they are spacecraft.

[TripleSeven]

He was kind and said "I have never done a walk around on a real Triple Seven" and my reply was "Fortunately for all of us, I have. many many many times. SAfe flights"

Starliner is going to be an amazing vehicle...it will always have a pilot

So now we need a pre-launch walk-around of the LV & SC?  Leave it behind; does not apply.  Yes, these SC will always have a "pilot" because someone has to be in command and ultimately responsible.  Don't conflate that responsibility with the actions you perform piloting an aircraft.  These are not aircraft, they are spacecraft.

some one a person or persons do the pre launch walk or look  around...I am the last person to do the walkaround... mechanics sign it off for each leg

thats the rules everywhere

being in charge and the "responsible person" is well the lets call it "person in command" in Turkish the translation is "person responsible for the mission"  in english it is "person in command"

not machine   I like what the Russians do before they board...but no we dont do that

STarliner is an amazing vehicle..it in my view will be the one that changes history for human spaceflight

I am a Boeing person