High Speed Databus Evaluation: Further Work

Work on advanced modular avionic architectures is gathering pace in both military and civil sectors as the need for higher performance systems increases. It is generally accepted that building an advanced avionic architecture is a difficult task requiring a wide range of tools to specify, assess, design and implement the final system. In addition, specific knowledge must be gained to understand the capabilities and limitations for each of the system elements of an avionic architecture particularly the system databus and associated protocols.

Since 1987 ERA Technology and DRA Farnborough have been studying the communication elements of avionic architectures and have been developing tools to assess their capabilities. This paper describes some of the background work undertaken and the tools used, and specifically examines the work of the most recent study aimed at understanding and using the following high speed databuses:

• Linear Token Passing Bus (LTPB) (1)*
• High Speed Ring Bus (HSRB) (2)
• Fibre Distributed Data Interface (3)