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Semiconductor Lifeline Keeps Fighter Jets in the Air

79 points by rbanffy

by CobaltFire

0 subcomment

This is actually a topic I have deep experience with.
I wrote both test bench and aircraft code to replace an F/A-18 (C/D) chip in the RPYC (Roll Pitch Yaw Computer) due to the original being NLA. If I recall correctly (this was a couple decades ago now) the new chip was NEARLY a drop in but had a slightly different rise/fall curve and a couple of ns faster response. It was the closest I could find but required software updates to both the aircraft and the test bench to not be an issue.
So yeah, this has been an issue for decades. I'm personally glad to see a company addressing that market.

by fmajid

4 subcomments

It's surprising the DoD didn't require stockpiles of spares for every electronic component in these phenomenally expensive and long-lived weapon systems. This is after all the one arm of the Federal Government that is both good at logistics and planning, and was able to deliver frozen ice cream and other amenities to the most remote Forward Operating Bases in Afghanistan.

by ggm

2 subcomments

Turtles all the way down and up: Vehicle makers sourcing plug-compatible devices which emulate floppy drives for updating tank s/w, Airlines sourcing print and terminals emulating IBM mainframe era dependencies for gate check processes.
Talking of mainframes, many core bank registry functions are emulations of prior systems long embedded into architectures now themselves superseded. Support for tech archaisms has long roots.

by CaliforniaKarl

2 subcomments

This makes me think of Jazz Semiconductor in Newport Beach. I think they’re Tower Semiconductor now, but I believe they’re still there, a small fab in SoCal that I assume is making obscure, important stuff.

by egl2020

0 subcomment

Nothing new under the sun: Strobe Data did this decades years ago for things like PDP-11s (http://www.strobedata.com/home/pioneer10.html) and DG Novas.

by aimattb

0 subcomment

Go get them. If you look heard enough you may find stock piles of these chips in warehouse somewhere that someone bought off an auction. maybe not on ebay:) but these days you never know.

by bear8642

2 subcomments

> "[Phoenix] repackages off-the-shelf semiconductors into devices that are virtually identical to the phased-out chips."
I'm slightly surprised that _virtually_ identical chips are allowed. I expected truly identical chips to be required…