GD World, Volume 14, Issue 6, June 1984 Page: 2 of 4
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H. G. Rickover
Delivery Is Set
For Late June
The Hyman G. Rickover has been
scheduled for delivery to the Navy late
this month after completing "very success-
ful" initial sea trials.
The 688-class, fast-attack submarine
bearing the name of "the father of the
nuclear Navy" has been scheduled to be
commissioned in July.
The Rickover (SSN 709) recently put in
the shortest first (Alpha) sea trial of any
ship in her class built by Electric Boat.
The trial lasted about 24 hours.
The trials were performed under the
direction of Admiral Kinnaird R. McKee,
Director of the Naval Nuclear Propulsion
Program. The ship was commanded dur-
ing the trial by Captain Fredrik H. M.
Spruitenburg.
"The trials were very, very successful,"
reported Chuck Chorlton, Manager of
Test and Docks at Electric Boat. "Every-
thing worked exceptionally well, and the
ship had the fastest turnaround time on
an initial sea trial that we have had yet."
Aboard for the trial was a 34-person
Electric Boat test crew plus a Navy crew
contingent. The senior EB official aboard
was Fritz Tovar, Electric Boat Vice Presi-
dent and General Manager.
The Rickover is the 17th ship of her
class to be built by Electric Boat. She was
launched at Electric Boat's Groton, Conn.,
shipyard on August 27, 1983. Her sponsor
was Admiral Rickover's wife, Eleonore.
EB Submarine
To Be Named for
Pittsburgh, Pa.
The Navy has assigned the name Pitts-
burgh to SSN 720, Electric Boat's 20th
688-class, fast-attack submarine.
The new boat will be the first subma-
rine and the fourth U.S. naval ship to be
named in honor of the steel-producing city
in Pennsylvania. The first Pittsburgh, a
175-foot sidewheel ironclad gunboat,
served from 1862 to 1865 and saw action
in the Civil War.
The second ship to carry the name, a
504-foot armored cruiser (CA 4), was in
the fleet from 1905 to 1931 and partici-
pated in World War I.
The third Pittsburgh, a 675-foot heavy
cruiser (CA 72), served from 1944 to 1970
and earned two battle stars for hertservice
in World War II in the Pacific theater.
The new Pittsburgh is scheduled to be
launched later this year. The 360-foot,
6,900-ton submarine is one of 10 now
being built by Electric Boat. The division
so far has delivered 16 of the ships.
USAF Awards
CMAG Contract
Convair has been awarded an $18.9
million Air Force contract for research and
development of a Cruise Missile Advanced
Guidance (CMAG) system.
During the 42-month advanced guid-
ance technology development program
for the Aeronautical Systems Division,
Convair will design, fabricate and flight-
test a guidance system using laser radar
and autonomous guidance processors.
"This is a significant contract for Con-
vair and is the direct result of more than
four years of development effort," said
Brad Sowers, CMAG Program Manager.
"This new guidance capability will greatly
expand the missions and effectiveness ofour cruise missile product lines for the
future."
According to Sowers, Convair will de-
velop the laser radar, guidance processors
and software that are expected to provide
a new capability for navigation update,
terrain-following, obstacle avoidance,
precision terminal homing and target
classification.V
6
V
i-V
It
Ground Formation. A rare opportunity to get five
displayed on the flight line at Fort Worth. From left todifferent F-16 versions in one photo occurred recently when they were
right are the F-16C, F-16A, F-16F, F-16/ 79 and AFTI/ F-16.Convair Will Develop Composite Electronics Div.
Joints for Large Space Structures Delivers F-4Convair has been awarded a $490,000
contract by the U.S. Air Force's Aeronau-
tical Systems Division's Flight Dynamics
Laboratory to develop precision structural
composite joints for use in future large
space structures.
The study will concentrate on the joints
of two baseline deployable beam systems,
the Structural Assembly Demonstration
Experiment (SADE) developed by NASA,
and the Convair-developed GEO-truss.
The original joints in both systems were
of metal; the new joints will replace them
with composite materials which are more
dimensionally stable when exposed to the
temperature extremes of outer space.
Since the beam systems, which will be
the building blocks of any future space
system, may contain thousands of joints,
even minute amounts of clearance in them
will result in unacceptable amounts offree play when joined in structures hun-
dreds of feet long.
The three-year program outlined in the
Air Force contract will involve design,
analysis, fabrication and testing of proto-
type joints made of both resin matrix and
metal matrix composites.
Convair has extensive experience in
manufacturing space-related composite
components. An earlier Convair program
reduced the weight of the Space Shuttle
midfuselage section by nearly 1,300
pounds by use of boron/aluminum com-
posite struts. Convair also designed and
built the 20-foot-long graphite/epoxy
booms for the Shuttle's Remote Manipu-
lator System.
Other Convair composite hardware was
included in NASA's H EAO-B spacecraft,
the LANDSAT-D satellite and the NASA
magnetic survey satellite.Test Station
A special avionics test station to sup-
port the F-4 fighter has been delivered by
the Electronics Division to the Sacramen-
to (Calif.) Air Logistics Center.
The test station, a modification of the
company's Processors-Pneumatics Sta-
tion for the F-16C/ D Avionics Intermedi-
ate Shop, will be used by the Air Force to
test the central air data computer and the
altitude encoder unit of the F-4. The cen-
tral air data computer provides corrected
inputs to the aircraft's dynamic cockpit
instruments, such as the altimeter, air-
speed indicator and the angle-of-attack
indicator.
Built under contract to the Air Force's
San Antonio (Tex.) Air Logistics Center,
the station was delivered two months
ahead of contract schedule.Subassembly Facility is a GD-Navajo Partnership
Continued from Page 1
The General Dynamics-Navajo associ-
ation is the result of fortunate timing. In
1967, the Bureau of Indian Affairs was
encouraging industry to locate on Indian
lands, and Pomona at that time needed to
expand its electronic assembly capability.
Discussions were held between represen-
tatives of the division, the Bureau of
Indian Affairs and the Navajo Tribal
Council, and the talks resulted in the tribe
constructing a plant which was leased to
General Dynamics.
Today, 250 Navajo employees are as-
sembling circuit cards for Standard Mis-
sile and Phalanx and round wire harnesses
for Standard Missile cables, and the op-
portunity exists for Navajo employees to
advance on the job. The plant opened with
a management team of 26 non-Indians.
Conference. John R. Hunt, at left,
Superintendent of Phalanx and one of
the Navajo Indians who have risen to
management posts at the facility, dis-
cusses a production matter with Harri-
son Pierce, Facilities Support Manager.Today, out of 22 employees on the man-
agement staff, 14 are Indians.
Plant Manager Mike Enfield's immedi-
ate staff includes three Navajos: Dennis
Hardy, Superintendent of Standard Mis-
sile, who began working at the Navajo
facility 16 years ago; John R. Hunt, Super-
intendent of Phalanx, who rejoined the
division earlier this year after previously
working at Navajo, and Edna Yazzie, who
joined the facility about 15 years ago and
is now in charge of Quality Assurance.
Navajo facility employees describe their
work as a continuing challenge. Mattie
Singer, a production supervisor for Stan-
dard Missile, said the challenge exists in
the need to learn to operate new equip-
ment. "I like it when there is a lot of
challenge," she said. "In the 16 years I've
worked at General Dynamics, I've enjoyed
every minute. There are so many things I
have benefited from here."
Hunt said there is a challenge in train-
ing workers to keep up with new technol-
ogy. "We've just finished the final transi-
tion of Phalanx subassemblies to Navajo,"
he said. "We are now involved in assembly
work all the way from insertion of elec-
tronic components into circuit cards to
final assembly."
Growth has continued over the years,
in both the number of employees and in
production, and planning is under way
with the Navajo Tribal Council to build a
15,000-square-foot addition to the exist-
ing 28,255-square-foot facility.
The growth in employees and floor
space reflects the increased production
and production support work on the
Standard Missile and Phalanx lines.
According to Enfield, "One thing the
expansion will do is move the harnesswork out of trailers, where they had to go
to make room for the Phalanx program."
In addition to serving as a major em-
ployer on the reservation, General
Dynamics supports the Navajo commu-
nity in other ways. Recently, the corpora-
tion contributed to the capital campaign
for a Navajo Educational Center that will
bring together the groups which adminis-
ter schools on tribal lands, including the
State of Arizona, the Bureau of Indian
Affairs, religious groups and private con-
tractors. Earlier, Pomona arranged for
Fort Worth to donate a surplus fire truck
to the Navajo Fire Department.
Enfield is active in the community as a
volunteer and serves in the Department
of Public Safety of the Navajo Nation. He
is also President of the Navajo Nation Fire
Department and President of the Window
Rock High School Vocational Advisory
Committee.
Tours to Orient
Well Received
The first "Window to the Orient" tour,
which returned on May 26th from Korea,
Japan and Hong Kong, has received high
marks from participants, according to
survey forms they filled out after their
travel was completed.
A second tour, consisting of 42 partici-
pants and two escorts, left for the Orient
on June 16th, and reservations are now
being accepted for the September and
October departures.
The tours are being offered by General
Dynamics to employees, their families,
retirees and friends through the Ask Mr.
Foster Travel Service, toll free phone
800-321-9553.t 1Y '_
Page 2
GENERAL DYNAMICS WORLD
June 1984
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General Dynamics Corporation. GD World, Volume 14, Issue 6, June 1984, periodical, June 1984; St. Louis, Missouri. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth1108921/m1/2/: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company, Fort Worth.