Thomas John Benzie MSc CEng MRAeS

Tom is an extremely experienced Chartered Engineer with the ability to work within all phases of a project life cycle, from project concept definition through to end of project life. he has strong Systems Thinking, Systems Engineering and mathematical modelling skills, with the ability to hold technical and project discussions at all levels within the Aerospace industry.

ENGINEERING SOFTWARE PACKAGES

Foreign Expert Aircraft Functional Definition / Systems Integration and Systems Architecture      01/15 – Present

Company: Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC). Shanghai

Definition of Aircraft Functional and Systems Architecture and processes for new aircraft projects.

Taking Stakeholder Requirements and objectives and defining the aircraft functions required to satisfy these requirements.

Defining the functional interfaces and the physical / data flows between the functions, during the full range of aircraft operational scenarios, and definition of all top-level aircraft requirements based on these functions using ECS as the exemplar system.

Derivation of all aircraft level functions and requirements to a level where they can be allocated to various sub systems and creation of the resultant aircraft systems architecture using ECS as the exemplar system.

Initial Validation / Verification / Integration / Certification Planning.

Creation of the local Systems Engineering Management Plan and the COMAC Model Based Systems Engineering (MBSE) philosophy for the company.

Creation of Model Based Engineering (MBE) methodologies for aircraft air systems for future projects and sustainable aviation goals.

Foreign Expert ECS and Wing Anti-Ice System / Aircraft Functional Definition and Integration 06/12 – 01/15

Company: Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC). Shanghai

Definition of Aircraft level functions and functional requirements for ECS, Pressurisation, Pneumatics, Ice and Rain Protection, Fire Protection and Oxygen Systems, in accordance with ARP4754A.

Working with the Systems teams to help them understand the processes for deriving, validating, managing and verifying systems level requirements within a DOORS environment.

Validation and Verification of Aircraft level requirements. Creation of Aircraft Integration, Validation and Verification Plans.

Responsible for providing expertise on all technical, training and program aspects for the Environmental Control and Wing Anti Ice Systems, from current design level through to aircraft certification.

Involvement with all levels within the company, from junior Engineers, through to the COMAC Chairman and President.

The role also involved close liaison with, and management of, suppliers at senior levels.

This was a truly challenging role, both professionally and culturally.

Engineering Director / Chief Engineer 04/09 – 06/12

Company: Thermal Design Solutions Limited

This role required combining both technical and business knowledge, allowing customer requirements to be fully understood, whilst also bringing a clear understanding of the technical tasks that needed to be achieved.  A challenging role that contributed significantly to my becoming a Chartered Engineer. The nature of the business often necessitated working on several projects concurrently.

Product: Online Aircraft Systems Training Course (01/11 – 06/12)

I compiled an online version of a popular Aircraft Systems training course. Working with the original course authors, we revised the course for online use. This required extensive study of all aircraft mechanical systems to ensure that the information that we passed to prospective candidates was both valid and topical.

Product: Upgraded Pod Temperature Control System – TERMA INDUSTRIES, DENMARK (09/11 – 06/12)

I assisted a European manufacturer to assess the impact of changes to their Reconnaissance Pod on the pod temperature control system. This involved extensive thermal modelling in MATLAB / Simulink and verification of the model against flight test data.

Product: Hybrid Air Vehicle Environmental Control System – HAV LIMITED, UK (08/10 – 06/12)

I developed the world’s first Environmental Control System for a Hybrid Air Vehicle.

This involved the full engineering development life cycle, from distillation of Air Vehicle Requirements into an Environmental Control System Specification, full system performance calculations, all thermal calculations, pressure loss calculations, establishing temperature control logic, interfacing with suppliers and customers and creating overall performance test procedures. The project timescales were extremely short and this necessitated using innovative techniques to satisfy the system requirements.

Product: Development Pod Environmental Control System – AMETEK TECHNOLOGIES, UK (11/09 – 09/10)

I assisted the UK client with the development of a Vapour Cycle Environmental Control System for a pod mounted application. The task involved extensive airflow analyses and sizing of the Ram Air inlet.

Product: BAE Systems Military Aircraft (Samlesbury), BAE SYSTEMS, UK (04/09 – 12/10)

I was involved in examining the role of Engineering in the supply chain throughout the whole of BAE Systems. This led to fundamental changes in the way that BAE deals with contracts that require availability of a product (from an individual part to an aircraft for a mission).

I established a new Engineering in the Supply Chain Function. This involved setting up the Governance and Assurance Framework and ensuring that all assets that have been developed within the Capability Development team were available to the Function and therefore across all Military Air Systems projects.

Technical Director 06/01 – 04/09

Company: RFT Systems (Aerospace) Ltd

The nature of the business often necessitated working on several projects concurrently. 

Product: Prototype Pod Mounted Environmental Control System, ADD, SOUTH KOREA (10/08 – 02/09)

I was part of a two-man team that developed a revolutionary Air Cycle Environmental Control System for a pod mounted application. I produced all the design calculations, developed in Matlab Simulink and ESATAN. The task involved full project management of the work-package and control of our Scottish based subcontract design team.

Product: Agusta Westland Helicopters VH-71, AGUSTA WESTLAND, UK (07/06 – 07/08)

I developed the steady state thermal models for various bays and compartments on the VH-71, initially utilising Excel and ESATAN with further development in Matlab Simulink.

Product:  RFT Systems / Airbus UAV Conditioning Study (04/07 – 04/09)

This was a privately funded long-term study to investigate the thermal control techniques required for the next generations of Reconnaissance and Combat Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. The study examined technologies that were currently available and those that would need to be developed to meet the severe limitations on available power, space and weight. Particular focus was given to providing a very stable thermal environment for the operation of the Optical and Infrared systems. In addition to studying the hardware available, extensive research was performed to determine the analysis software requirements and how existing software could be modified to provide the degrees of accuracy required from the analyses.

Product: Farnborough Aircraft Corporation F1C Kestrel, FACL, UK (09/06 – 11/06)

I developed a cabin conditioning system and windscreen demist system for the prototype aircraft. This involved repeating initial cabin heat load analyses and the sizing of an appropriate conditioning system along with coordinating a team effort to integrate the system onto the aircraft. The entire process, from concept definition to aircraft installation, was completed within 8 weeks.

Product: Panavia Tornado, BAE SYSTEMS, UK (08/05 – 11/08)

Working with BAE Systems both on site at Warton and from the RFT offices. The work was divided between the Environmental Control System (ECS) and the Fuel System.

I developed effective conditioning system solutions for the Tornado Sustainment Program, designed to keep Tornado in service for another 20 years. Tasks included the creation of mathematical models in CVENT, ACSYS and Excel, creation of system requirements documentation, creation of rig test plans, analysis of rig test results, correlation against the mathematical models, creation of aircraft airworthiness flight clearance documentation and ensuring that the project remained to time and cost

Product: Serck Aviation Fuel Cooled Oil Cooler (05/05 – 08/05)

I worked alongside Serck Aviation to expedite Project Management issues for the BOEING 787 Variable Frequency Starter Generator Fuel Cooled Oil Cooler and to resolve thermal and pressure issues. The task was primarily focused on recovery of the project plan to ensure deliveries could be achieved as per the contract that Serck had with their client. The task was successfully completed and delivered 2 weeks ahead of schedule.

Product: Terma Industries F-35 Composite Pod, TERMA INDUSTRIES, DENMARK (08/04 – 08/05)

I was responsible for ensuring that the venting of the gases within the pod could be achieved at all altitudes. This task involved extensive air intake calculations, pressure loss analyses and transient analysis of heat transferred through conduction, convection and radiation. All calculations were performed from first principles with the resulting series of equations integrated into SIMULINK to allow fully transient modelling of the system as a function of varying atmospheric conditions as well as time and system operating status.

Product: Agusta Westland Helicopters EH101, AGUSTA WESTLAND, UK (06/03 – 08/03)

I created the steady state and transient thermal models of the aircraft cabin in Excel and SIMULINK. These models were used to define the heating and cooling requirements for future variants of the EH101, including the variant being purchased, at that time, by the U.S. Marine Corp for transportation of the U.S. President.

Product: Terma Industries Modular Reconnaissance Pod, TERMA INDUSTRIES, DENMARK (01/02 – 12/05)

I worked with our customer to take a new Pod Environmental Control System from concept to full definition. This involved a full requirements analysis of the Final Customers overall specification and flow down of these requirements directly into the Environmental Control System Specification. In addition to the System Specification I created the Statement of Work that was placed on the successful supplier and a Product Specification that was supplied to the Final Customer.

In order to achieve the above, it was also necessary to establish a Systems Engineering Structure within the company, to define what documents were required at what phase in the project.

I completed detailed Steady State and Transient Thermal Analyses in Excel and SIMULINK to define the required performance from the ECS and established the control logic to ensure that the temperature within the pod will not vary by more than +/- 5°C per hour (with the pod skin temperature varying between –60 to 105°C). These Thermal Models were validated by both ground and flight testing and were used for overall system qualification.

Product: Farnborough Aircraft F1C, FACL, UK (06/01-12/01)

I was responsible for various aspects for the Air Systems on this new six seat air taxi.

Involvement started at the beginning of the detailed project definition phase and the task was to take the Air Systems from a relatively immature state to a stage where initial Supplier Specifications could be issued for the various subsystems.

This involved creating steady state and transient thermal models in Excel and SIMULINK for the aircraft, to determine the amount of heating and cooling required for the aircraft cabin during all phases of flight. Initial airflow calculations were also performed using Flowmaster 2 flow modelling software.

ECS Engineer (Contract) 08/96 – 06/01

Company: BAE SYSTEMS (Military Aircraft), Farnborough / Warton  

Product: NIMROD MRA4

I was team lead of the NIMROD MRA4 Avionics Cooling Team, based at initially at Farnborough and then at Warton.

My primary task was to ensure the successful cooling of over 350 pieces of Avionics equipment mounted in more than 15 Equipment Racks and Workstations.

Secondary tasks included assisting with the successful integration of the water/waste system, assisting with rack and workstation design concepts and methodologies, helping with cabin conditioning calculations and systems engineering tasks and integration of the Radar Cooling System.

My role involved extensive air flow and thermal calculations to ensure that the equipment received the cooling required to give reliable operation and to meet specified cooling requirements.

In order to ensure this happened there was close liaison with the programme partners throughout the world, at all levels.

There were also significant integration tasks to ensure successful installation of the equipment, and this involved liaison across 4 BAE SYSTEMS sites and their Sub-Contractors.

In addition to the above there were the normal Systems Engineering tasks including the creation of Equipment Specifications, assessment of supplier proposals, equipment selection, creation of test documentation (rig test, build test and flight test), assessment of test results, verification of mathematical models and creation of certification reports.

Thermal Engineer (Contract) 09/92 – 08/96

Company: FIAR SpA – Milan  

Product: Grifo-F (F5), APS784 (EH101), ECR90 (EUROFIGHTER 2000), Grifo-7 (F7), Grifo-M  (MIRAGE III), Grifo-L (L159)

I was responsible for the Thermal Analysis of the above airborne radar systems (or parts there of). Analyses methods considered conduction, natural and forced convection and radiation modes of heat transfer. Analysis tasks included Steady state and transient analyses, analysis of rotating systems and pressure drop predictions. Analyses ranged from over all definition of system cooling requirements and methods to calculation of individual component junction temperatures.

Calculations were done either by hand or using I-DEAS SUPERTAB or through the development of in-house task specific software.

Analyses were initially validated using lab test data and then by flight testing, requiring extensive analysis of the cooling systems for the F-5, Mirage III and F7. This led to the definition of critical flight test phases and liaison / discussion with the aircraft integration teams on ECS system level improvements.

I was also the Mechanical Design Authority for Mirage III and F7-P Radome upgrades. Tasks included co-ordination of design, production, testing and approval of all designs and documents relating to the above Radomes.

ECS Engineer (Contract) 01/91 – 09/92

Company: British Aerospace Commercial Aircraft – Prestwick

Product: Jetstream 31 & 41 (19 and 29 seat) Turbo-Prop Aircraft

I was responsible for taking the for Oxygen System, Vapour Cycle system, Air Data system and Windshield Wash/Wipe system from Concept through to FAR25 and JAR25 certification (including all documentation and both ground and flight testing)

Additional tasks included:

• Thermal Analysis of the pneumatic de-icing system and Avionics Bay.
• Analysis of ECS and Cabin Pressurisation system flight test results.
• Definition of Smoke evacuation procedures and testing.
• Solution of mechanical problems associated with flight testing.
• MSG 3 analysis and analysis presentation during working group sessions.
• Liaison with FAA and JAA certification teams through certification meetings.
• Close liaison with design, production and test departments.
• Liaison with suppliers and customers at all levels.

ECS Engineer (Contract) 05/90 – 01/91

Company: British Aerospace Military Aircraft – Warton

Product: Tornado ECR Variant

My role was to perform the Thermal Analysis and optimisation of ECS air distribution system.

This involved:

• Prediction of equipment and bay temperatures. Analysis involved all heat transfer modes, including Aerodynamic (Kinetic) Heating, and pressure drop predictions. All calculations were done by hand from first principles.
• Interpretation and analysis of flight test data.
• Solution of mechanical problems associated with flight test.
• Liaison with opposite numbers in Germany and Italy.

Thermal Engineer (Contract) 10/88 – 05/90

Company: GEC-Ferranti – Edinburgh

Product: HaveGlance & TIALD Avionic Pods

My task was to perform the thermal analysis of airborne electro-optic podded avionics considering all heat-transfer modes, including aerodynamic heating.

The analyses covered the thermal effects on electro-optics of spot heating, analysis of the effects of heat induced optical distortion, electronic box analysis, Circuit board analysis, Thermal mounting of optics, Heat exchanger optimization and pressure drop calculations. All calculations were done by hand or using in-house developed software or ESATAN.

Additional tasks included:

• Study of humidity effects on optics and selection of dehydrators.
• Creation and development of task specific software and revue of thermal software requirements
• Presentation of results customers at Corporate and Governmental levels.

Thermal Engineer (Permanent) 09/86 – 09/88

Company: GEC-Marconi – Milton Keynes

Product: Foxhunter Radar

My role was to perform the thermal and flow analysis of airborne radar systems using all modes of heat-transfer. This covered all aspects of the radar systems, from overall system level analysis to prediction of individual junction temperatures. The analyses were done by hand calculation or using MELTAN or SINDA.

Additional tasks included:

• Testing and acceptance of Radar ground cooling equipment.
• Study and modification of cooling system for Automatic Test Equipment racks.

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