AVIONICS

Avionics Industry
Moving Towards
Open Systems
Integrated Modular
Avionics (IMA)
Rahul.G
(Under the guidance of Narendran.J & Kumaralingam.R)

HCL Technologies, India

December 2008

Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) | December 2008

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction

Need for Integrated Modular Avionics

Federated Architecture

Closed Integrated Modular Avionics Architecture

Open System Integrated Modular Avionics Architecture

Conclusion

References

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Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) | December 2008

Introduction
Avionics is the science and technology of electronics applied to aeronautics and
astronautics or the electronic circuits and device of an aerospace vehicle. Federated
avionics architectures make use of distributed avionics functions that are packaged
as self-contained units. Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) architectures employ
a high-integrity, partitioned environment that hosts multiple avionics functions
of different criticalities on a shared computing platform. IMA technology and
the standards that apply to it are still quite new as compared to the service life of
many presently deployed federated avionics systems [2]. Existing industry open
standards for IMA such as ARINC 653 are quite limited in scope when considering
the IMA platform as a whole. At present, there exists no open standards body
with a platform-wide vision of IMA. Therefore the avionics industry is foregoing
the many benefits of open standards already being realized in other industries [2].
For example, the Automotive Open System Architecture (AUTOSAR) standard
promotes reusability, scalability, transferability, and modularity in the automotive
industry [7]. This article focuses on the implementation technique for avionics
architectures, which are characterized as Federated (in the past), Closed Integrated
Modular Avionics (in the present) and Open Integrated Modular Avionics (in the
future). Also this article describes the basic principles of various architecture
implementations with their advantages and disadvantages.

Need for Integrated Modular Avionics

Airframers are trying hard to reduce the weight and power consumption for
their new aircraft. It is a challenge for them to accomplish this with reduced
development expenses and design cycle times. IMA architecture is a solution
that allows the airframers to optimize their avionics implementations to achieve


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Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) | December 2008

reduced weight and power consumption. The benefits of IMA are encouraging a
transition from Federated avionics architecture [1].
The Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) concept, which replaces numerous
separate processors and line replaceable units (LRU) with fewer, more centralized
processing units, is promising significant weight reduction and maintenance
savings in the new generation of commercial airliners [5].
There are two types of IMA architectures that a system architect can choose when
they transition from federated architectures to IMA architectures: Open and
Closed. An open IMA architecture utilizes interfaces that are non-proprietary,
and adhere to interface definitions available in the public domain. Closed IMA
architectures utilize proprietary interfaces that are custom implementations that
typically are optimised for the present applications [1].

Federated Architecture
The traditional implementation technique for avionics can be characterized
as federated, which means each aircraft function consists of a stand-alone
composition of sensors, processing units and actuators. In federated architecture
each system has its own interfaces to sensors and actuators. Data is not shared,
therefore providing intrinsic partitioning of functions, which are local to the
system. The interfaces mostly have ARINC 429 data communication and specific
analogue or discrete signals.
Figure 1 below shows a landing gear system, which is connected in a federated
architecture. It consists of a user interface defined by a landing gear processing
unit, display and control. This user interface is used to control the effector based
upon feedback collected from a sensor. These are developed as three separate
units connected by dedicated communication channels. Here in this example
there are three Central Processing Units (CPUs), five I/O Modules + Network
Interface Modules and four Physical Communication Channels.
CONTROL

DISPLAY

LANDING GEAR
PROCESSING UNIT

EFFECTOR

SENSOR

I/O

I/O

CPU

CPU

CPU

I/O

I/O

I/O

Physical Communication Channels

Figure 1: Example of a Federated Architecture

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Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) | December 2008

The disadvantage of this kind of technology is the fact that each box has a specific
function, with specifically developed hardware and software. Each system is more
or less developed from scratch, with the lack of technology re-use. Especially the
hardware components suffer from obsolescence issues. Another disadvantage
is the increased weight and power consumption due to the fact that each unit
carries the burden of environmental protection and inherent power dissipation
issues. Moreover, looking at the logistics consequences of federated systems, it
implies a very non-efficient way of handling spare parts because systems are not
interchangeable. Also in a federated architecture the data is not shared among
various systems, this introduces dedicated communication channels and also
increases the weight of the aircraft resulting in poor fuel efficiency and more
power consumption.
Figure 2 shows that data is not shared in a federated architecture and also each
system is considered as a separate box with its specific hardware and software.

SYSTEM 1

SYSTEM 2

SYSTEM 3

Figure 2: Stand-alone Systems in a Federated Architecture

Closed Integrated Modular Avionics

Architecture
Todays modern avionics system architectures contain a high level of integration.
Sensor data is a shared between several systems. Even modularity is introduced
to a certain extent, especially on hardware module level. It has been an avionics
supplier choice to provide a completely integrated modular avionics system to
the aircraft integrator [6]. In most cases there is core computer that performs the
majority of avionics functions. Inside this core computer several modules can
be identified performing a specific function, like the flight control, landing gear,
display control, etc.

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Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) | December 2008

SYSTEM

Figure 3 Data Sharing in IMA Architecture

IMA architectures provide shared computing communications, and I/O resource

pool that is portioned for use that is portioned for use by multiple avionics
functions (see Figure 3). The avionics function that are hosted on the IMA
platform can consist of differing assurance due to robust portioning mechanisms
that are inherent to the architecture [1].
A characteristic of these replaceable modules (LRMs) is that they are developed
according to proprietary standards defined by the supplier. To ease maintenance,
and to a certain extent reduce the hardware obsolescence risk; modules have a
standard physical layout that fits within a standard modular housing, which in it
self in most case is again a LRU (Line replaceable units). Still an advantage of
these integrated modular architectures is the intrinsic portioning between aircraft
functions, which ease the certification process. Another characteristic are the use
of modern digital avionics busses, like the ARINC659, ARINC629, MIL-STD
1553 and other proprietary busses [6].

CONTROL

DISPLAY

LANDING GEAR
PROCESSING UNIT

EFFECTOR

SENSOR

Common I/O
Unit
Network
Interface

Network
Interface

Common Communication Network

Network
Interface
Common I/O
Unit
Figure 4: Example of IMA Architecture

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Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) | December 2008

Figure 4 shows the implementation of Landing gear System using the Closed IMA
architecture, which has an optimized set of shared computing resources. It also
uses less physical resources when compared to the federated system that hosts
an equivalent set of functions. The quantity of Central Processing Units (CPUs)
is reduced from three to one. Finally the number of physical communication
channels is reduced from four to one.
The fact that in these modern architectures there is still a strong connection
of aircraft function to a module prevents the inter-changeability of different
modules. This also implies obsolescence issues. Another disadvantage is that
mostly proprietary standards are used, making the changes very expensive and
introducing a uppliermonopoly, as competition is not possible.

Open System Integrated Modular Avionics

Architecture
Trend in avionics system architecture is towards general-purpose avionics
computers, which are defined as platforms. A platform in itself is not performing
any avionics function, but provides communication, computing and memory
resources to the avionics (software) applications (see Figure 5). This is something
similar to a desktop PC providing a required resource (hardware, communication,
memory, operating system services) to the applications.

Platform

Application

Figure 5: Open IMA System-Generic Platform shared to an application

The platform has a generic processor hosting several systems functionality. The
core software inside the platform provides the portioning of the functions, which
can be distributed across the architecture. The platforms are common digital
modules with standard input/output interfaces. Data communication takes place
via networks like AFDX (Avionics Full Duplex Switched Ethernet). All the data
from sensors and other equipments are translated from/to the standard data
network. The network is configured to route the information anywhere within
the architecture, which eases the system integration.

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Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) | December 2008

Each avionics computer has a standardized open system interface, which is defined
as an Application Programming Interface (API). This API is defined standard like
ARINC653. When such API is used third parties can develop application for the
platform, enhancing competitiveness of both avionics platform and application
suppliers.

Display Control Application

Landing Gear Application

API

Flight Control Application

A platform can host several aircraft application (see Figure 6) can host several
applications which is mostly software but could also include application specific
hardware. The software applications are fully isolated by portioning mechanisms.
Partioning enable safe sharing of the processing resource (time), the memory
(space) and communication means (input/output).

Operating System
Board Support Package
CPU/IO
Operating
System

Communication and IO
Figure 6: Architecture of Avionics Computer

The avionics computer platform acts as a standard building blocks and are
interoperable, further it is possible to mix components from different suppliers,
which increase competitiveness. Most engineering cost will be at the application
level where the complex functionality is located. Open systems modular avionics
provides a flexible design that can be changed and optimized in a late stage
during development. Platforms contain configuration tables to define application
resource allocation and communication infrastructure.
As the structure of the modules network is unified, it is mandatory to use a
common API to access the hardware and network resources, thus simplifying
the hardware and software integration. IMA concept also allows the Application
developers to focus on the Application layer, reducing the risk of defaults in the
lower-level software layers [5]. As modules often share an extensive part of their
hardware and lower-level software architecture, maintenance of the modules is
easier than with previous specific architectures. Applications can be reconfigured
on spare modules if the module that supports them is detected faulty during
operations, increasing the overall responsibility of the avionics functions [5].


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Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) | December 2008

Examples of aircraft avionics that uses IMA architecture [5]:

1 Rafale: Tehals IMA architecture is called MDPU (Modular Data Processing
Unit)
2 F-22 Raptor
3 Airbus A380
4 Boeing 787: GE Aviation Systems (formerly Smiths Aerospace) IMA
architecture is called Common Core System
5 Dassault Falcon 900, Falcon 2000, and Falcon 7X: Honeywells IMA
architecture is called MAU (Modular Avionics Units)
Also the usage of Open IMA has some challenges. Different suppliers, may
provide different building blocks of the system architecture, so in order to develop
an application on top of a platform, all information should be public. This faces a
challenge with respect to Intellectual Property Rights (IPR). Architecture building
blocks strongly depend on each others performance. Application suppliers
depend on the platform performance. The usage of configuration tables also
has a less positive side, in a complex architecture a lot of parameters need to be
managed. Configuration consistency and completeness is a challenge.

Conclusion
The open standards are universally agreed upon set of guidelines for
interoperability that exist in public domain. The benefits realized by their use
in any architecture are extensive and might include: true application portability,
enhanced reuse, reliable computing using dissimilar hardware, increased use
of Commercial Off-The Shelf (COTS) components, leveraging of intellectual
property, harnessing industry wide knowledge, decreased product development
cycle times and also increased system value (better quality, lower cost).Thus it can
be concluded that a Open Systems IMA technology for avionics architecture
is required to counter hardware components obsolescence issues and increase
system flexibility.

References
[1] Transitioning from federated avionics architectures to Integrated Modular
Avionics Watkins, C.B.Walter, R, GE Aviation, Grand Rapids October 21,2007
26th Digital Avionic Conference
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?isnumber=4391811&ar
number=4391842&c ount=159&index=30
[2] Advancing open standards in Integrated Modular Avionics: An industry
analysis Littlefield-Lawwill, J. Viswanathan, R.
GE Aviation, Grand Rapids October 21, 2007 26th Digital Avionic
Conference
http://www.ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?isnumber=439181
1&arnumber=43918 48&count=159&index=36


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Integrated Modular Avionics (IMA) | December 2008

[3] Application of a civil Integrated Modular Architecture to military transport

aircraft
Ramaker, R.Krug, W.Phebus, GE Aviation, Grand Rapids October 21,2007
26th Digital Avionic Conference
http://www.ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?tp=&arnumber=
4391845&isnumber= 4391811
[4] Integrated Modular Avionics: Less is more
http://www.aviationtoday.com/av/categories/commercial/8420.html
[5] Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Integrated_Modular_Avionics
[6] Open Systems Integrated Modular Avionics The Real Thing, Rene L.C
Eveleens National Aerospace Laboratory, Mission Systems Engineering.
http://www.rto.nato.int
[7] Automotive Open System Architecture (AUTOSAR)
http://www.autosar.org/find02.php

10

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