Target Acquisition Designation Sight, Pilot Night Vision System
Encyclopedia
Sensor
A sensor is a device that measures a physical quantity and converts it into a signal which can be read by an observer or by an instrument. For example, a mercury-in-glass thermometer converts the measured temperature into expansion and contraction of a liquid which can be read on a calibrated...
and targeting unit fitted to the Boeing AH-64 Apache helicopter
Helicopter
A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by one or more engine-driven rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forwards, backwards, and laterally...
. Both systems are independent, but housed together.
Lockheed Martin
Lockheed Martin
Lockheed Martin is an American global aerospace, defense, security, and advanced technology company with worldwide interests. It was formed by the merger of Lockheed Corporation with Martin Marietta in March 1995. It is headquartered in Bethesda, Maryland, in the Washington Metropolitan Area....
signed the original TADS/PNVS production contract on 30 April 1982, and the first TADS/PNVS system was fielded in 1983.
Target Acquisition and Designation Sights (TADS)
TADS contains stabilized electro-optical sensors, a laser rangefinder and laser target designatorLaser designator
A laser designator is a laser light source which is used to designate a target. Laser designators provide targeting for laser guided bombs, missiles, or precision artillery munitions, such as the Paveway series of bombs, Lockheed-Martin's Hellfire, or the Copperhead round, respectively.When a...
. The TADS assembly can rotate +/- 120 degrees in azimuth, +30/-60 degrees in elevation
Elevation
The elevation of a geographic location is its height above a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational surface ....
and can move independently of the PNVS. The movements of TADS can be 'slaved' to the head movements of the helicopter
Helicopter
A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by one or more engine-driven rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forwards, backwards, and laterally...
crew to point where they are looking. This allows images from TADS to be projected onto the crew helmet
Helmet
A helmet is a form of protective gear worn on the head to protect it from injuries.Ceremonial or symbolic helmets without protective function are sometimes used. The oldest known use of helmets was by Assyrian soldiers in 900BC, who wore thick leather or bronze helmets to protect the head from...
-mounted optical sight
Sight (device)
A sight is a device used to assist aligning or aim weapons, surveying instruments, or other items by eye. Sights can be a simple set or system of markers that have to be aligned together as well as aligned with the target...
s, overlaid upon their view of the cockpit and battle space.
TADS contains a thermal imaging infrared
Infrared
Infrared light is electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength longer than that of visible light, measured from the nominal edge of visible red light at 0.74 micrometres , and extending conventionally to 300 µm...
camera
Camera
A camera is a device that records and stores images. These images may be still photographs or moving images such as videos or movies. The term camera comes from the camera obscura , an early mechanism for projecting images...
and a monochrome daylight television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
camera. With the improvements planned with M-TADS in the block III level AH-64D, the monochrome TV-camera is planned replaced with a full color camera.
It also used to contain direct-view optics
Optics
Optics is the branch of physics which involves the behavior and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that use or detect it. Optics usually describes the behavior of visible, ultraviolet, and infrared light...
(DVO) which the copilot/gunner
Air gunner
An air gunner a.k.a. aerial gunner is a member of an air force aircrew who operates flexible-mount or turret-mounted machine guns or autocannons in an aircraft...
(CPG) could see through the Optical Relay Tube (ORT). But in recently fielded models of the AH-64D the ORT along with the DVO has been removed as it was rarely used. It has been replaced in the co-pilot's cockpit by a third Multi Purpose Display.
Pilot Night Vision System
Mounted above the TADS, the Pilot Night Vision System (PNVS) contains an infraredInfrared
Infrared light is electromagnetic radiation with a wavelength longer than that of visible light, measured from the nominal edge of visible red light at 0.74 micrometres , and extending conventionally to 300 µm...
camera
Camera
A camera is a device that records and stores images. These images may be still photographs or moving images such as videos or movies. The term camera comes from the camera obscura , an early mechanism for projecting images...
slaved to the head movements of the pilot
Aviator
An aviator is a person who flies an aircraft. The first recorded use of the term was in 1887, as a variation of 'aviation', from the Latin avis , coined in 1863 by G. de la Landelle in Aviation Ou Navigation Aérienne...
. PNVS can rotate +/- 90 degrees in azimuth and +20/-45 degrees in elevation. PNVS has a high rate of movement (120° per second) so as to accurately match the head movements of the pilot.