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Fact: Over 50% of SSI Staff has 8 or More Years Experience
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Fact: Experienced Team Lead manages all projects
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Fact: SSI has been in business 16+ years
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Fact: SSI client relationships last several years
"The best thing about working with SSI is that the people genuinely care about the success of the overall project. Typical contractors stop when they have merely met the letter of the contract that they are bound to; where as, SSI is willing to go above and beyond to drive a project to completion and ultimately success." ~ SSI Client

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The Company – Emteq

EMTEQ is a worldwide leader in the production and supply of innovative products for the aviation community. Emteq specializes in avionics certification and integration, interior lighting, cabin comfort, and exterior lighting products for the military, corporate, HOS/VIP, helicopter, and air transport markets.

Skills – MPLAB Integrated Development Environment (IDE), an integrated toolset for the development of embedded applications employing Microchip's PIC® and dsPIC® microcontrollers, ICD 2 Debugger, PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) Controlled LEDs, Serial Communication via RS485, Bootloaders, Raw C.

The Task – Design Interior LED Lighting System for High End Private Aircraft

With FAA regulations for noise reduction, the challenge of this project was to create a “quiet” network of interior LED lights that could be controlled from the cockpit.

If lights are to run signals in sync, it would create an unacceptable 400 Hz hum. If the lights are allowed to run signals randomly, the hum would come and go with peaks and valleys. This network of lights was required to run “quietly” consistently.

The SSI Solution – FAA Regulated Network of Interior LED Lighting System

SSI’s complete design included a board schematic, board application, bootloader, customized protocol, and PC application to configure the board. The initially chosen processor PIC16 microcontroller was not powerful or small enough to meet the requirements, so the design was changed to use the more powerful PIC24 processor.

SSI’s solution supports up to 250 chains of LED lights, addressable individually or as a group. Each chain of light can have an unlimited number of lights in the chain, limited only by hardware and not software.

The central controller PC application allows for system setup and configuration as well as monitoring, testing and troubleshooting ensuring proper installation. The system is also field upgradeable via a custom bootloader to allow for new software to be loaded at any time.

When it came to the development toolset, navigating through Microchip datasheets for nuances can easily turn a learning curve into a learning cliff. Development in this environment requires expert embedded experience with the Microchip family, which SSI could provide to our clients.