Universal Avionics (UA) has announced the successful on-wing update of an InSight Display System's core software via remote connection to an aircraft located 6,000 miles away in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Working with authorised dealer Redimec, UA updated the Hawker 800XP's three InSight EFI-1040 displays, dual Touch EFIS control display units (ECDU), and dual alphanumeric keyboards (ANK) from its Tucson, Arizona, location. The aircraft was updated by making a remote connection to a Redimec laptop, which was connected to the maintenance port of a data concentrator unit (DCU) II mounted on the aircraft.

“As a company, we always look for innovative capabilities and solutions to support our dealers and end customers,” comments Dror Yahav, UA CEO. “Remote connection is an unprecedented use of technology that allows us to instantly sync, troubleshoot, diagnose and configure systems while they are installed in an aircraft. This is a unique solution to the challenging times we're currently faced with due to COVID-19, where travel is difficult or not at all possible. By utilising remote access tools, we can increase aircraft readiness and reduce downtime.”

The successful completion of this remote connection presents extensive possibilities for UA, its authorised dealers/integrators, and end customers, as it allows system configuration and software updates to be carried out remotely by UA's field service engineers when it is impossible or impractical to travel to the aircraft. In this case, the effort saved 10 or more days of aircraft downtime that would have resulted from the dealer needing to ship the equipment from Argentina to UA's repair station in Tucson and for UA to ship the equipment back for final installation. Moving forward, this system enables UA to remotely assist its customers with virtual diagnostic and troubleshooting of InSight.