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[ Jet engine revving up ]

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[ Sonic boom ]

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[ Music ]

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>> From an early age, I found
that I had a fair amount

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of mechanical intellect
just from playing

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with Legos and K'Nex.

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From the crazy designs that
I used to come up with,

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it was pretty obvious to
me that I needed to go

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into something with design.

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[ Music ]

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>> When I was a kid,
I raised birds,

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and I also liked
everything mechanical.

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I got a car from my grandpa,
and I took it completely apart

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and put it back together again.

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Here's the HUD
camera prototype.

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I want to see if it fits.

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That's way too big.

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This is the HUD right there.

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>> Yeah.

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>> So, yeah, we don't
have much room at all.

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I've always liked
mechanical things,

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and I think engineering was
just the perfect fit for me.

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I think I was born to do this.

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[ Music ]

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>> I went to air shows when I
was a kid where you could fly

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in the plane for a penny a pound

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so it was a pretty good
deal when you're little.

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And I think, at that
point in time,

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I always thought I'd be working
on aircraft in the future.

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Aero mechanical design group
integrates hardware and systems

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into typical military
and commercial aircraft

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to make them flight
research vehicles.

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>> A common task for the
design group is creating

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and designing a bracket
or a fixtures

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to hold a research instrument
on one of our airplanes.

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>> You might have a new probe
that goes on an airplane

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and they want to fly it on an
F-15, we'll help build a probe

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or tell them where
they can put it

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or tell them what their limits
are and what we can do for them.

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>> Generally, it'll
be an instrument

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that measures something
in the air or some sort

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of camera system, that
kind of thing as far

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as taking what somebody
already did

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and integrating it
into the aircraft.

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>> We are the middleman
in coming up with the data

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for research projects.

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>> A lot of the design work
that we do has to account

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for the environment that
airplanes operate in.

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That might include climate,
where it gets very cold

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and very hot, and being able to
function well in the air stream

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if something is mounted on
the outside of the airplane.

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It also has to account
for precipitation

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and corrosive effects of
the environment to make sure

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that the air worthiness

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of the part isn't
compromised during its mission.

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For example, if a sensor is
being mounted to the skin

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of a wing, we might have to
design or change the shape

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of the wing to allow for proper
airflow around it during flight.

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>> This is our Gulfstream
aircraft.

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And right now we're
testing a morphing flap.

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Basically, this flap flexes
instead of actuates downwards.

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My job in this project was to
facilitate the installation

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of the flap into the wing.

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Some of those roles
include creating drawings

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for structural components
that attach the two together

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and providing up-to-date
inspections,

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verifying that the flap
surfaces align well

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with the predicted flap data.

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Right now, I'm going to
bring in the reference model

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for the right wing that the
scan will be compared to.

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And you can see that we
have a really good match.

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Basically, the green shows

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that the two surfaces
are aligned very well.

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The blue surface is showing that
the surface is slightly below

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where we predicted
and red slightly above.

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It's important for us to know

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that the two surfaces
are aligned well

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because previous
predictions were based off

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of an idealized model.

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The idealized model tells
us that the plane is safe.

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However, if we go
back and we find

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out that the actual airplane
is not joining up well

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with that idealized
model, our predictions

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for flight safety
are no longer valid.

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[ Airplane Sounds ] [ Music ]

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[ Background conversation ]

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>>If we can-- if we put the cone
on and then just leave it.

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Can we leave it for a while?

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We'll come up with the design

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and then we'll often times
run it by the crew and decide

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if it's okay with them
as to where we put it

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and how it's going
to be mounted.

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And then we'll have
structures people look at it.

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Knock, knock.

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>> Yeah?

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>> We'll take the preliminary
drawings down to the shop,

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either sheet-metal or the
machine shop, and have them look

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at it-- see how manufacturable
it is.

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Is there a lot of difference between
manufacturability as far

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as aluminum vs. stainless-?

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>> Absolutely.

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>> On these parts?

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>> Oh, yeah.

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>> Aluminum would give
us a good trial maybe.

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>> That's fine. We could always come back and make another one.

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>> Right.

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>> Are you redrawing
this now, then?

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Are you making
some modifications?

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>> I'm just making the fixes.

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>> Okay.

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>> All right.

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>> And then when you
do, bring it back over.

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>> Yeah, I will.

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>> So we can look it over again.

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>> That sounds good.

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>> Okay.

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>> Thank you sir.

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>> All righty.

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>> All right.

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This is the inside
of that nose cone

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that we're looking to put on.

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We've gotten the nominal
sizes of the equipment

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from instrumentation and
we put that on the pallet.

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We only have so much real estate
so we have to just make sure

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that everything is adequately
spaced, we know how big it is.

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And we're just taking those
components and doing a--

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just making sure we have
enough room for everything.

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[ Airplane taking off ]

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>> In SOFIA, we added all kinds
of things to the aircraft inside

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and outside, pretty extensive
modifications on that aircraft.

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We had to install large
thermal insulation blankets

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and foam insulation into
the telescope cavity.

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We added maintenance
stairways and scaffolding

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into the cavity,
added all the racks.

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[ Airplane landing ]

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>> After the part
has been installed

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and it's been signed off, we may
be called back to do revisions

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if the project requirements
change while the part is

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being used.

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For example, we found that
the cameras on the back

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of the aircraft were
getting way too cold.

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Because they were getting cold,

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they were distorting
the lens and, thus,

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distorting the picture

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that people were seeing
in the control room.

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I'll be taking a look at that
and trying to find out a way

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to prevent the cameras
from getting too cold

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so we don't have this
problem in the future.

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>> The HD camera goes to minus
22 degrees when we're at 40,000.

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>> I think what's happening
is you've got an aluminum body

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which contracts a lot with cold.

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>> Exactly. Yeah.

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>> And it's just
crushing the lands.

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>> So it's not even
the polycarbonate that's the problem,

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It's the body.

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>> If we take the
case that you can--

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you're talking about and
we cut it in such a way

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that we fit it into--
like take-out--

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>> This RTV.

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Make this hole a
little bit bigger

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and then glue the case to the panel, so that the camera's still not really touching the case...

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>> That sounds good.

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Okay. We'll do that.

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>> I like designing because I
get to try to be imaginative,

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try to figure out things, develop my own ideas on how to do something.

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It's interesting to me.

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>> You never know what good idea is going to turn into something great.

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>> One of the coolest things
about my job is I get to work

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on nearly all the
airplanes at the center.

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On one particular day,
I might be working

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on a remote control airplane, a
glider, and a fighter aircraft.

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On another, it might be a 747
or a small propellered airplane.

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What keeps the job interesting
is the great amount of variety

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of design tasks that
are always required.

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We provide support in many
engineering areas kind

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of like handymen for
the engineering world.

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>> I think a lot of people think that engineering isn't creative as art or something,

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but there's a lot of different things you can do with the facts you have.

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And that's what I like about engineering. We're doing good science and we're trying to make the world a

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better place.