Navigation computer E6-B
The navigation computer E6-B , short form E6-B, English E6B flight computer , called Drehmeier in the aviation language , is an analog computer to support computing processes in flight planning and flight navigation . The calculating disc rule has largely been replaced in practical use by electronic computers and software , but is still used by student pilots in flight training .
Functionality
The following calculations can be carried out with the navigation computer:
- Conversion of
- Mile in statute mile
- Imperial gallon to US gallon
- Volume of oil and fuel by weight
- Gallons to liters , feet to meters, and pounds to kilograms
- Minutes to seconds
- Mach number in true airspeed
- Degrees Fahrenheit to degrees Celsius
- Calculation in flight navigation of speed over ground , distance and time. The third value can be calculated if the two other values are available.
- Fuel consumption and the available flight time with the available fuel.
- True airspeed and the density altitude
- True height .
- Course corrections in case of drift
- Range
On the page for the wind calculations, a wind triangle can be calculated based on the flight weather , including the necessary course correction.
history
The E6-B was developed by the US Navy engineer and reserve officer Philip Dalton in the late 1930s . As a lieutenant captain of the naval aviation he was a military pilot himself . After the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, the United States Army Air Forces introduced the E6-B as a navigation computer. Around 400,000 E6-B navigation computers were purchased during World War II . In Germany, the Knemeyer triangular calculator was developed at the same time and used as a navigation aid by the air forces of the German Wehrmacht .
In the post-war period, the flight computer also spread to the civilian sector, when pilots and navigators continued their work there. Over time, towards the end of the 20th century, the E6-B was increasingly replaced by electronic computers, flight planning software and on-board computers from commercial flight operations . Today it is mostly only used for training in general aviation flight schools . The student pilot should learn to carry out flight planning and flight navigation without complicated technical aids. In the theory test for the private pilot license and thus the test in flight planning and flight navigation of the US Federal Aviation Administration, only a non-freely programmable pocket calculator and a mechanical navigation computer such as the E6-B are permitted.
In addition, the functions of the navigation computer E6-B are now available as a pocket calculator, as a mobile app or as a web application. The mechanical navigation computer E6-B is still produced by various manufacturers and is made of metal , plastic or cardboard .
Trivia
Spock , a character from the Spaceship Enterprise series, a US science fiction television series from the 1960s, used an E6-B navigation computer several times:
- As a result of the implosion in the spiral , he uses the E6-B to calculate the time it takes for the spaceship to crash onto a planet.
- In The Women of Mr Mudd and The Temple of Apollo , he holds it in his hand.
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ Heiko Stolzke: PPL theoretical knowledge Drehmeier theory refreshed - round calculator. aerokurier, May 30, 2011, accessed September 24, 2019 .
- ↑ E6B Flight Computer Instructions. Gleim Aviation, accessed on September 28, 2019 .
- ↑ a b Pablo Valerio: E6B Computer: Celebrating 75 Years Of Flight. Information Week, December 30, 2015, accessed September 27, 2019 .
- ^ Ronald van Riet: Knemeyer triangle calculator. (PDF) Andrew Mitchell, accessed May 5, 2017 .
- ↑ Pilot's Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge. Federal Aviation Administration, 2016, pp. 16-12 , accessed September 28, 2019 .
- ↑ Recreational Pilot and Private Pilot Knowledge Test Guide FAA-G-8082-17. (PDF) Federal Aviation Administration, February 2017, accessed September 28, 2019 .