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automatically advance power on the good engine to help prevent the stall. It keeps the pilot in control and the airplane right side up.”
Easier Said Than Done
As you may well expect, developing a system as sophisticated as Thrust- Sense didn’t come easy. Even to a com- pany with “Innovative Solutions” in its name.
“Right after we got a Pilatus, I de- cided then to develop the autothrottle system, but it was a lot easier said than done,” Hedrick said. “For the next 15 years, we worked on it until we came up with a very simple, retrofit- table actuator that is truly failsafe. We put it on our airplane, and it works perfectly.”
“We developed our first ThrustSense Autothrottle system for our PC-12, but the team saw more potential, so IS&S purchased a King Air to use for the twin-engine program,” Grunbeck said. “With the King Air, we had two main hurdles from the retrofit standpoint: system size and cost. There were al- ready autothrottle systems available, but they are very expensive and add too much weight.”
“We overcame both hurdles through a combination of developing our own proprietary actuators and doing some- thing I think is incredibly innovative: Our engineers built the autothrottle’s controlling computer into our integrat- ed standby unit (ISU),” he continued. “So, the retrofit installation requires replacing the legacy standby unit with our ISU and adding the actuators into the existing throttle quadrant. That greatly simplifies the installation.”
Grunbeck said that the new IS&S actuators are very light, small, and extremely reliable. And the entire system weighs in at only 5 pounds – about one-sixth of other autothrot- tle systems.
“Our actuators are extremely sensi- tive and accurate. They can actually move the power levers the width of a human hair,” he said. “There’s no hunting power at cruise to maintain airspeed. The system does it all.”
Full-Regime Benefits
autothrottle available for retrofit on the PC-12 and Collins Pro Line 21 and Fusion-equipped King Air family,” Grunbeck said. “Some other production autothrottles are engaged in climb and not on takeoff. The ben- efits of full-regime operation are an extremely important differentia- tor for us.”
According to Grunbeck, the pat- ented ThrustSense full-regime autothrottle provides automatic
power management from takeoff to touchdown, including go-arounds. In addition, the system protects the en- gine against operator-induced speed exceedances, engine over-torque, and under-temp – all of which greatly en- hance the safety and operational value of the aircraft.
“We pride ourselves in delivering truly innovative and unique solu- tions to problems. For example, the autothrottles feature our patented
“ThrustSense is the only full-regime
AOPA Finance
February 2021 / TWIN & TURBINE • 19