EPMT provides long-term 3D archiving software for the Eurofighter project

"Our EXPRESS Data Manager™ has been used in the Eurofighter project since 1999," states Kjell Bengtsson, marketing director of Jotne EPM Technology. "This new project will use our technology and the knowledge from EADS to develop the next generation of archiving solutions and open up new business opportunities for EPMT in the aerospace and defense industries. We are extremely pleased with the success we have achieved so far and look forward to continuing our close cooperation with EADS."

Companies within the aerospace industry are legally obligated to keep all aircraft-related data such as technical specifications and two dimensional drawings. As a result, this data usually goes through an archival process. Information is retrieved and reproduced in the event of an air accident, for example, to help evaluate possible causes, determine responsibility or shed light on a possible construction error.

Today, given the extensive use of computers in aircraft design and construction, the archiving process has become a real challenge. Three-dimensional models are on-screen mathematical representations that cannot be archived by printing them out and filming them as is currently done with 2D drawings. Furthermore, these models are created by specific software applications in specific formats that may not remain interpretable over multiple generations. Clearly, systems, formats and software applications are changing, evolving or disappearing at ever-increasing rates.

The aim of MIMER is to develop a solution for keeping industrial data over a long period of time (at least 50 years) that is independent of platforms, system environments and file formats. International standards will play a key role as the guarantor for longevity in the final result.

The MIMER extensions to the existing capabilities of the EXPRESS Data Manager™ will result in EDMvisibility™. This product will include the usual EDM database server functionality and EXPRESS data verification capabilities in addition to several new modules:

• A program library to support the verification and possible healing of boundary representation geometry and topology as required by prEN9300-110.
• A STEP geometry browser so that errors in product shape can be visualized and analyzed on the screen.

In addition, EPMT will develop an archival-specific management application to keep track of the archived information.

EADS Military Air Systems has decided to use the following standards for archiving their construction data:

• ISO 10303-514 for product geometry.
• ISO 10303-214 for product-data management data. ISO 10303 is the basis for STEP and PLCS, among others.
• prEN9300-110 for long-term archiving and retrieval of explicit geometry (originally developed by AECMA and the LOTAR project).
• ISO 14721:2003 for specifying a reference model for an open archival information system (OAIS). The purpose of the standard is to establish a system for archiving information, both digitalized and physical, with an organizational scheme composed of people who accept the responsibility to preserve information and make it available to a designated community.

To fulfil legal and certification requirements the stored form of the data shall be an accurate representation of the source data. In other words: the quality of the archived data shall be as good as possible to enable a true reconstruction whenever necessary, possibly far in the future. All of the standards, especially prEN9300-110, include data quality requirements. MIMER will deliver the software that verifies data against these requirements before archiving.

The contract between Jotne EPM Technoloy and EADS is part of an industrial participation agreement (IPA) between the Norwegian Ministry of Defense, the Norwegian Ministry of Trade and Industry, several Norwegian companies, and the Eurofighter consortium.