Brantel
Well Known Member
Some of you may have seen that PS Engineering just added/released a brand new audio panel to their product lineup; the PMA450.
A little over 6 months ago I was contacted by Mark Scheuer, founder of PS Engineering and he was excited about a new product they were developing and since I am somewhat local to their facility, he asked me if I would be interested in stopping by and taking a look at what they were doing and to offer some feedback that may influence their end product.
A little over a week after my surgery I was scheduled to be in the West Knoxville area for a surgeon followup and I was ready to get out of the house so I told Mark, heck yeah! So with a stack of legal forms filled with all sorts of official sounding mumbo jumbo in hand my wife and I met Mark at his office and was given a grand tour of his manufacturing facility. You see PS Engineering may be a small company but there is a lot of high tech going on behind those walls. I doubt most people that live in the area have a clue that such a company exist in such an unassuming area/building.
Mark is a very energetic personality that is obviously totally engrossed and passionate about what he does for a living. He ushered us around his facility showing us the design, receiving, assembly, testing, shipping, and service areas and introduced us to many of his employees some of which have been with him for a long time. I was most impressed with the assembly area which was filled with a room full of highly automated pick and place PCB assembly machines. My heart was with the folks in the testing and service area however as they were the ones with benches full of test gear, scopes and such that will always have a special place in my background.
At this point the show and tell was over and Mark gets all serious and politely asked my wife to split off from us and wait in the lobby. I was then taken over to another building where I was introduced to additional members of PS Engineering's skunk works. I then was told what they were working on and was all excited to see the prototype when Mark told me that the design only existed virtually and that on that day he will be having me to interact with a software simulator.
I thought that was different but OK. Mark then sat me down in his chair behind his desk and fired up the simulator. While him and several of his crew watched, I was asked to interact with this virtual copy of their new product. At first it was a little intimidating having all these guys standing over me watching me hunt and peck, clicking around on the unit. Mark explained that the purpose of this test was to see how well they had done designing the new user interface. Apparently their goal was to make it so simple that a pilot could install it and start using it right out of the box with little to no user manual required. After about a minute of clicking around discovering how it worked, I was in full evaluation mode interacting with the designers and offering suggestions. It must have gone well because we continued for about 30-40 minutes exploring all the unit had to offer and Mark was taking notes. Toward the end of our meeting, Mark explained that prototype boards were due in soon and that they would consider the results of that day's testing and comments and that he would be in touch with me soon.
Fast forward a few weeks and Mark contacts me to let me know he had a prototype for me to test. Mark wanted to fly it over to me as soon as possible so that I could give it a good test drive. Mark did just that, he flew his airplane over to my airport with one of the prototypes in hand. Mark had told me that the new unit was compatible with my existing tray and wiring. However I was a little nervous about that and hoped no smoke would escape when I turned on the panel. My fears were soon relieved when I did flip the switch and everything worked as expected. Mark explained that many of the suggestions I had made while at his office made it into this initial prototype. That was exciting to hear! We quickly went thru the basics of the new unit and Mark left me with it to test in actual conditions.
I will spare you all the details that transpired between then and the public product announcement but I would like to share a few things. Mark and his team are some of the most receptive folks I have ever met when it comes to receiving critical feedback about their product. I am a tell it like it is guy and when I noticed something that was not right or could be improved, Mark would take the feedback, go straight back to his folks and soon I would see a new unit ready for testing. Mark made many trips back and forth with his airplane picking up and dropping off prototypes. He was very adamant about making the new unit as perfect as possible. I was in shock most of the time that he would go thru such effort just for a minor tweak or suggestion. Once the weather was bad after I discovered some noise issues when dimming my 3 screen G3X system. Mark shows up in his car with 2 other engineers and a pile of test equipment. Here is a shot of what took place that day:
Needless to say, they gathered the data they needed and a few days later I had another prototype in hand with the issue completely resolved. After a few more exchanges similar to this, I started running out of suggestions and was running low on issues to resolve. Mark informed me that they were deep in the process of obtaining the TSO for the unit and that I would have a "production quality" prototype soon. Soon thereafter Mark delivered on his promise and a new unit was delivered with a real molded faceplace that fit like a glove into my panel.
I was going to give a big spill on how the user interface works on this new unit but PS Engineering took it a step further and created a simulator you can download to get a feel for how the unit works and how easy it is to interact with and configure:
http://www.ps-engineering.com/Apps/PMA450.exe
Something new to the PS Engineering products is the introduction of their "IntelliAudio True Dimensional Sound" which apparently was developed under license from technology invented for use by fighter pilots and the AirForce. I had never used any type of system like this but it works very well with today's sophisticated panels that typically include multiple COM radios and other audio sources that we must decipher and understand all at the same time. Here is a diagram of the basics of this technology:
PS Engineering was made famous by their IntelliVox automatic intercom squelch technology and many pilots know and love this feature. This technology is also included with the PMA450 and my understanding is it has been improved even over their PMA8000 series.
The new user interface is super simple with very nice knobs and buttons that give the user great feedback/touch and feel. The backlit monochrome screen is easy to see in all lighting conditions and is end user adjustable for brightness and contrast. The unit sports a photocell for automatic dimming and also has a dimmer circuit input that can control the knob/button backlighting.
A little over 6 months ago I was contacted by Mark Scheuer, founder of PS Engineering and he was excited about a new product they were developing and since I am somewhat local to their facility, he asked me if I would be interested in stopping by and taking a look at what they were doing and to offer some feedback that may influence their end product.
A little over a week after my surgery I was scheduled to be in the West Knoxville area for a surgeon followup and I was ready to get out of the house so I told Mark, heck yeah! So with a stack of legal forms filled with all sorts of official sounding mumbo jumbo in hand my wife and I met Mark at his office and was given a grand tour of his manufacturing facility. You see PS Engineering may be a small company but there is a lot of high tech going on behind those walls. I doubt most people that live in the area have a clue that such a company exist in such an unassuming area/building.
Mark is a very energetic personality that is obviously totally engrossed and passionate about what he does for a living. He ushered us around his facility showing us the design, receiving, assembly, testing, shipping, and service areas and introduced us to many of his employees some of which have been with him for a long time. I was most impressed with the assembly area which was filled with a room full of highly automated pick and place PCB assembly machines. My heart was with the folks in the testing and service area however as they were the ones with benches full of test gear, scopes and such that will always have a special place in my background.
At this point the show and tell was over and Mark gets all serious and politely asked my wife to split off from us and wait in the lobby. I was then taken over to another building where I was introduced to additional members of PS Engineering's skunk works. I then was told what they were working on and was all excited to see the prototype when Mark told me that the design only existed virtually and that on that day he will be having me to interact with a software simulator.
I thought that was different but OK. Mark then sat me down in his chair behind his desk and fired up the simulator. While him and several of his crew watched, I was asked to interact with this virtual copy of their new product. At first it was a little intimidating having all these guys standing over me watching me hunt and peck, clicking around on the unit. Mark explained that the purpose of this test was to see how well they had done designing the new user interface. Apparently their goal was to make it so simple that a pilot could install it and start using it right out of the box with little to no user manual required. After about a minute of clicking around discovering how it worked, I was in full evaluation mode interacting with the designers and offering suggestions. It must have gone well because we continued for about 30-40 minutes exploring all the unit had to offer and Mark was taking notes. Toward the end of our meeting, Mark explained that prototype boards were due in soon and that they would consider the results of that day's testing and comments and that he would be in touch with me soon.
Fast forward a few weeks and Mark contacts me to let me know he had a prototype for me to test. Mark wanted to fly it over to me as soon as possible so that I could give it a good test drive. Mark did just that, he flew his airplane over to my airport with one of the prototypes in hand. Mark had told me that the new unit was compatible with my existing tray and wiring. However I was a little nervous about that and hoped no smoke would escape when I turned on the panel. My fears were soon relieved when I did flip the switch and everything worked as expected. Mark explained that many of the suggestions I had made while at his office made it into this initial prototype. That was exciting to hear! We quickly went thru the basics of the new unit and Mark left me with it to test in actual conditions.
I will spare you all the details that transpired between then and the public product announcement but I would like to share a few things. Mark and his team are some of the most receptive folks I have ever met when it comes to receiving critical feedback about their product. I am a tell it like it is guy and when I noticed something that was not right or could be improved, Mark would take the feedback, go straight back to his folks and soon I would see a new unit ready for testing. Mark made many trips back and forth with his airplane picking up and dropping off prototypes. He was very adamant about making the new unit as perfect as possible. I was in shock most of the time that he would go thru such effort just for a minor tweak or suggestion. Once the weather was bad after I discovered some noise issues when dimming my 3 screen G3X system. Mark shows up in his car with 2 other engineers and a pile of test equipment. Here is a shot of what took place that day:
Needless to say, they gathered the data they needed and a few days later I had another prototype in hand with the issue completely resolved. After a few more exchanges similar to this, I started running out of suggestions and was running low on issues to resolve. Mark informed me that they were deep in the process of obtaining the TSO for the unit and that I would have a "production quality" prototype soon. Soon thereafter Mark delivered on his promise and a new unit was delivered with a real molded faceplace that fit like a glove into my panel.
I was going to give a big spill on how the user interface works on this new unit but PS Engineering took it a step further and created a simulator you can download to get a feel for how the unit works and how easy it is to interact with and configure:
http://www.ps-engineering.com/Apps/PMA450.exe
Something new to the PS Engineering products is the introduction of their "IntelliAudio True Dimensional Sound" which apparently was developed under license from technology invented for use by fighter pilots and the AirForce. I had never used any type of system like this but it works very well with today's sophisticated panels that typically include multiple COM radios and other audio sources that we must decipher and understand all at the same time. Here is a diagram of the basics of this technology:
PS Engineering was made famous by their IntelliVox automatic intercom squelch technology and many pilots know and love this feature. This technology is also included with the PMA450 and my understanding is it has been improved even over their PMA8000 series.
The new user interface is super simple with very nice knobs and buttons that give the user great feedback/touch and feel. The backlit monochrome screen is easy to see in all lighting conditions and is end user adjustable for brightness and contrast. The unit sports a photocell for automatic dimming and also has a dimmer circuit input that can control the knob/button backlighting.
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