Honeywell has unveiled a new version of its IntuVue weather radar family—the RDR-7000—for upgrading older radars on the in-service fleet and forward-fit applications in new aircraft. The RDR-7000 will be available for a variety of airplanes and helicopters that can accommodate a 12-inch antenna, although it will also be available with an 18-inch antenna. The new radar is on display his week at Honeywell’s NBAA-BACE booth (N4302).
Like the IntuVue RDR-4000, the RDR-7000 gives pilots a vertical view of storms. “IntuVue is the only radar that provides a full-up vertical view,” said Vipul Gupta, senior director of product marketing for Honeywell Aerospace. “It scans the entire volume of air, from zero feet from the ground to 60,000 feet.” The radar’s “3D volumetric scanning,” according to Honeywell, automatically analyzes “a storm cloud in 17 different scans…providing a 3D view of the entire storm cell.” IntuVue “can detect hazardous weather like hail and lightning, [and show] predictive windshear and present it in an intuitive and simple-to-understand display,” he said. “Current radars require the active involvement of the pilot to make a mental image of what the 3D picture looks like.”
Honeywell’s legacy radars are still found in nearly 10,000 aircraft, according to Gupta, and the RDR-7000 is designed for a relatively simple retrofit, with the same bolt pattern as the legacy radars. “It’s not a massive upgrade,” he said, with a new antenna, adaptor cable, and transmitter/receiver unit, but reuse of the controller, which is fitted with a new faceplate. “This allows us to expand the IntuVue platform on more aircraft, with the same functionality in half the weight on more smaller business jets and helicopters,” he said.
RDR-7000 system weight is about 16 pounds with a single LRU, while the RDR-4000 weighs about 35 pounds and consists of three LRUs.
Retrofits of the RDR-7000 will be available starting in April 2020 via an approved model list STC. Some of the aircraft for which the RDR-7000 will be available include the Dassault Falcon 900; Bombardier Global Express and 5000, Learjet 40/45, and Challenger 600/601; Cessna Citation III, VI, and X, along with 560, V, Ultra, and 550 Bravo; Hawker 800; Embraer ERJ-135/145; ATR 42/72; and de Havilland Dash 8-100. Honeywell will offer trade-in credits for older Honeywell equipment.
Honeywell has flight tested the RDR-7000 for 300 hours on five platforms, including a helicopter. The company is working with aircraft manufacturers for new aircraft applications, said Gupta. “We’re actively working with OEMs, and it will be available on some forward-fit platforms next year, and that will snowball in 2021. The aftermarket is a big focus for 2020.”