Introduction to Fly-by-Wire Flight Control Systems: The professional pilot’s guide to understanding modern aircraft controls. Paperback – 22 Dec. 2021

Non technical contents. An user manual?

This is a review of the Kindle version. I think this book fills a niche that has been empty for far too long. I really like the way the book is organized, but weighing in a mere 37 pages it feels almost more like an outline that a fully fleshed out book - my benchmark is "Handling the Big Jets" by D. P. Davies. David Kern discussed all of the mainstream pitch control laws in civilian aircraft, but the C* and C*U (NzU) laws used by Airbus and Boeing respectively get simplified to a g-command law, when in fact they are a blend of pitch rate command at low airspeed and g-command at high airspeed. The Airbus C* law in particular is interesting as it lacks speed stability, which seems like an odd design choice for an aircraft that needs to maintain airspeeds precisely. Mitigated in large part by effective autothrottle, but the failure cases and accident history are interesting. I'd also think the book would benefit from some diagrams of what the aircraft's trajectory looks like with control inputs with various control laws (e.g. like the Airbus Flight Briefing Book for the A320) and how these control laws respond in unusual attitudes. Additional items to discuss would include lateral an directional control laws (bank angle command, roll rate command, yaw rate command) such as are implemented on the B787. From the observation that there has never been an alpha limiter that hasn't been defeated, there may be lessons learned from accidents with fly-by-wire aircraft (some that come to mind are Air France F-GFKC at Mulhouse, AF 447, the XL Airways Germany A320 crash, and US AIR 1549 [ NTSB says Sully ended up on the alpha limit due to lack of speed stability, resulting in a hard touchdown which damaged the aft fuselage, rendering the aft exits unusable]). Lastly, the F-35 dynamic inversion control scheme gets a mention, but I feel more detail is warranted as I am sure it is just a matter of time before this trickles into a civilian application.

Really liked the book and I recommend it to anyone heading into a FBW aircraft or simply wanting to understand the concepts behind FBW. When I went through initial in a fully FBW airplane I wish I had a better grasp of the flight control system.It is short, easy to read and understand while still getting the concepts explained without requiring an engineering degree.

Written in plain English and easy enough for any pilot to understand with nuggets of nerdery well placed. Improve your flight controls vocabulary and understanding with this one.

A very simple, yet elegant description of FBW systems. I think, I'll have my students read this. I enjoyed it!

Well written introduction to fly by wire basics for pilots. Test pilot Kern breaks down engineering “mumbo jumbo” into easy to understand introduction to fly by wire concepts.