Castle has a successful history of designing and building light-weight aluminum electronics racks and consoles for military airborne programs. These custom designed racks and consoles are specifically designed to carry heavy equipment loads while meeting specific crash-load and ultimate flight loading conditions. The individual designs consider where the enclosure is located in the aircraft, orientation of the enclosure and varying g-force loading. A stress analysis is performed to determine the lowest possible weight for each enclosure.

Some designs require EMI shielding. For these applications custom designed filters are used to shield the equipment cooling vents and conductive gaskets seal doors and side panels.

Castle has supplied equipment racks and consoles to several major electronics manufacturers, system integrators, major sub-contractors and prime contractors.

Innovative Airborne Laser Aircraft Application

Castle Industries designed, tested and produced a significant number of light-weight equipment racks for the U.S. Air Force Airborne Laser Program. The Airborne Laser is a multi-megawatt chemical laser, mounted in a Boeing 747-400 that is designed to destroy enemy missiles seconds after they are launched. Castle worked with Boeing, Lockheed Martin, TRW and AP Labs to build the custom designed racks that house the electronic gear used for target acquisition, tracking, pointing and beam control/fire control.

Mechanical Assemblies

Castle produces a variety of aircraft assemblies used in attendant seats, observer seats, electronic consoles, fuselage sections and decompression systems. These assemblies use the combined skills of welding, sheet metal working, metal machining, sewing and precision assembly. Some assemblies incorporate molded parts and components purchased from approved outside suppliers. These Castle offerings provide customers an opportunity to reduce cost and cut inventory.

Airplane Components

Parts for airplanes come in all shapes and sizes. Castle will fabricate to customer supplied drawings or can assist in designing components. Most applications use aluminum but Castle also works with titanium, stainless steel, composites and steel.

Castle has a complete machine shop and a metal fabricating shop that works with titanium and all types of aluminum alloys in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. Each month large and small quantities of tear straps, doublers, angles, stiffeners, brackets, channels, tees, intercostals, webs and seat clips are produced. These components are used to produce floor beams, door assemblies and fuselage sections.

Four Observer Seat Models

Aircraft observer seats are one of the product lines Castle is known for throughout the industry. One or two observer seats are wall mounted behind the pilots in commercial airplanes, for use by FAA observers and other airline personnel. For comfort, the seats are padded with sheepskin and have fold-down armrests.

Castle Observer seats come in four models for use on 757 and 767 models. The seats are also used in the crew rest area of some 747s. They all have either 4 or 5 point harnesses. This chart identifies the part numbers, airplane models and observer seat locations.

Armrests: Castle part numbers 0801801-10 and 0801801-11 have folding armrests and part numbers 0801801-12, 0801801-12 and 17-001-1 do not have armrests.

Upholstery: Castle part number 0801801-11 has all wool seat and backrest covers. Part number 0801801-10, 0801801-12 and 17-001-1 have sheepskin seat and backrest covers.

Replacement covers and cushions can be ordered directly from Castle Industries.

Castle also produces a crew rest seat for the C-17 military cargo aircraft. The design for this seat is complicated as it integrates oxygen lines and communications wiring. To streamline C-17 crew seat production, Castle engineers redrew the original plans to make them more practical for manufacture.

This demonstrates Castle design strengths, and the machining capability for big and small parts. Projects like these exhibit the flexibility to adapt to customer needs while creating a practical, durable product.