Inventors:
Lyle R. Appleford - Seattle WA
Assignee:
The Boeing Company - Seattle WA
International Classification:
G05D 108
Abstract:
Altitude rate commands are generated and fed to an aircraft autopilot to cause the aircraft to transition to a non-level flight path which corresponds to a portion of a calculated flight path profile stored in a flight management computer. When capture of the non-level path is initiated, altitude rate commands are generated in accordance with the equation h. sub. cmd =h. sub. path +k. sub. h. DELTA. h where h. sub. path is the altitude rate of the non-level segment,. DELTA. h is an altitude difference between current aircraft altitude and an altitude point on the non-level segment, and k. sub. h is an altitude error gain which is a nonlinear inverse function of altitude rate error,. DELTA. h, and which is calcuated in accordance with the equation k. sub. h =k. sub. 1 -k. sub. 2. vertline. DELTA. h. vertline. where k. sub. 1 and k. sub. 2 are predetermined constants.