A Digital Acquisition Unit (DAU), also known by some skilled in the art as a DFDAU, receives signals from many on-board aircraft systems. The DAU processes the data as Flight Operations Quality Assurance (FOQA) data, which is recovered from the aircraft by different prior art techniques. For example, a PCMCIA card may connect into an auxiliary PCMCIA slot of the Data Acquisition Unit and record data into a flash memory of the card. Once the data is collected into flash memory, airline operators manually replace the PCMCIA cards with a new card and retrieve the aircraft data from the flash memory of the old card.
Other prior art techniques for collecting this aircraft data include wireless systems, which often require costly aircraft modifications. For example, a separate unit to record data, such as a ground data link unit, is required, and an additional aircraft antenna must be mounted on the fuselage. Often aircraft wiring changes are made. These ground data link units require a data processor, a data collection circuit, a wireless LAN radio, a power amplifier, and external fuselage antenna. Multiple line receiver units are also often required adding to the significant investment made by an aircraft operator.
Examples of a ground data link systems that have been used in an aircraft are disclosed in commonly assigned U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,047,165; 6,104,914; 6,108,523; 6,148,179; 6,154,636; 6,154,637; 6,160,998; 6,163,681; 6,167,238; 6,167,239; 6,173,159; 6,308,044; 6,308,045; 6,353,734; 6,522,867; and 6,745,010, the disclosures which are hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety.
It would be desirable, however, to extract Flight Operations Quality Assurance data or other aircraft data from an aircraft component, such as a DAU, in a less complicated and costly system, rather than using a ground data link unit or manually replacing flash memory PCMCIA cards.