Officials at ARINC Inc. in Annapolis, Md., needed image intensifier tubes for their work on two advanced aviation programs. They found their solution at ITT Corp.’s Night Vision division in White Plains, N.Y.
ITT won a $14 million order for its 16-millimeter tubes from ARINC. ARINC engineers are integrating the image intensifier tubes into the Panoramic Night Vision Goggle (PNVG) and the Quad-Eye.
Both of these aviation solutions from ARINC are designed with four, rather than the traditional two, image tubes to expand the user’s field of view. The use of four direct-view tubes enables a 95-degree field of view—a boon to aviators, especially those in hostile environments.
The PNVGs are to be used by the U.S. Air Force and U.S. Army, whereas the Quad-Eye will be incorporated into Navy aviators’ Joint Helmet-Mounted Cueing System (JHMCS).
ITT Night Vision’s 16-millimeter tubes weigh 25 percent less than conventional 18-millimeter tubes. The 16-millimeter tubes are also employed in the Enhanced Night Vision Goggle (ENVG), the first sensor-fused, helmet-mounted monocular to combine infrared and image intensification imagery, produced by ITT for the U.S. Army.
“By compressing our Generation 3 technology into a smaller and lighter image intensifier tube, we are opening many new capabilities for head-mounted systems, as these quadruple-tube goggles illustrate,” says Mike Hayman, president of ITT Night Vision.
For more information, visit ITT Corp. online at www.itt.com.
