A page from: Frank Quinto's Field Journal

October 02, 1997

It's a sunny Thursday morning and I just made it to work on-time at 7:30 despite having to chase a Pekingese around the house. During most mornings, Calvin, our lovable Pekingese, is usually dozing off as my wife and I get ready for work. This morning he was a "ball of energy!" As I sit in front of my computer to check my day's schedule, I see that I will have a very busy afternoon. I have been at NASA Langley for over 17 years or around 4000 working days. No 2 days are ever alike, but they can be put into two categories: planning days and test days. Today is a planning day. My schedule is full of afternoon meetings, but the morning is a bit slower. The only thing on the morning schedule is planning, planning, and more planning. In an upcoming wind tunnel test, I will be the lead test engineer of a new test technique called, Dynamic Ground Effects. Part of the planning duties of a lead test engineer involves filling out a 30-page plus document called a "Test Plan." This document outlines the "who", the "what", the "when", and the "how" for the test. Most of this morning will be devoted to filling sections of the Test Plan for the Dynamic Ground Effects test. In all the other wind tunnel tests that I have been involved, the wind tunnel and the aircraft model conditions were set before data is taken. On this upcoming test, the data will be taken as the aircraft model is moved towards the wind tunnel floor, simulating a landing.

It is nearly 11:00 in the morning, I called my wife Beth, who also works at NASA Langley, to have an early lunch, so I can get ready for the Internet "web-chat" session at noon with students from around the country. After lunch, I called my "web-chat" coordinator to get some practice before the live chat. At noon, the questions, on the "chat" session, came in at a steady pace and I try to answer as many as I could, hoping not to leave any question un-answered. By 1:00 p.m., the chat session ended with almost 140 exchanges. Time flies when you are having a lot fun! Now I have about an hour to get ready for my first afternoon meeting, a Post-Test meeting. In these meetings, the staff tries to discuss the good and the bad things that occurred on a wind tunnel test. Our philosophy is that "we must learn from our mistakes, so will not repeat them in the future". Next in our staff meeting, our Facility Manager gave us an update on what is going in our Facility and as well as other Facilities. Since most of us are real busy either preparing for a test or are involved in a test, we do not have time to see what else is going on. Our staff meeting lets us catch up with the "happenings" of the rest of the world. It's almost 4:00 p.m. when the meeting ends. I go back to my office to read my E-mail messages I have received during my absence and also to hear any messages from my "Phonemail." I had a couple of each. By the time I finish hearing my last Phonemail message, I see my wife drive up to pick me up. Now it's time get home to walk the dog, help fix dinner, and get ready for Volleyball. NASA Langley has several volleyball leagues grouped by skill levels. On Thursday night, I played in the advance intermediate league and we won our match. Now it is time to go home, shower, and go to bed. The end of another exciting day in the life of a NASA Langley Test Engineer. Just one of over 4000 different days!

Test Day (Monday, October 13, 1997)

It is Day 3 for this test, Dynamic Ground Effects Test on Various Wing Planforms. The test started on Saturday, October 11 at 7:00 a.m. Our Facility, the 14- by 22-Foot Subsonic Tunnel, is temporary operating around-the-clock (24 hours/day, 7 days/week). Two of the five test engineers on this test have covered the weekend shifts for this test. I am one of the three engineers that cover the weekday shifts. This morning is my first day on this test. Even though I wrote the plan and schedules for this test, I need to read two days worth of notes to see where we are and where we need to go. It is especially tough after a long weekend. This past weekend was my sixteenth annual football get-together with my "dorm-mates" at Virginia Tech. Tech's football team was victorious over Boston College, 17-7 - GO HOKIES!!! I am reading the shift notes and listening to the Test Engineer from the previous shift tell what they did on their shift and what else is left for us to do on our shift before we can start the test.

I spent most of the morning determining why some instruments were not giving the right output. In trouble-shooting this problem, I normally work from the computer that is getting the information back to the instrument. As I try to track the problem, I will pass-by Technicians working on various items for the test. They will update their progress, so I know what is going on and also write it in the test log. In the log, I note how the Technicians did certain things or what the next shift should do or avoid. Communications among the staff and across the shifts is very, very important. Everyone has to know what is going on. It is like having a band playing the right note of a song at the right time. The band uses a song sheet to know when each note occurs, if they did not have it, they could play different notes at different times. The Test Plan that I put together earlier in the month, during my planning days, and the daily test logs are like that song sheet. I finally track the problem of the instrument output to an "interface" rack. The connections to power the instruments and the signal from them was NOT connected. I make the appropriate connections and now I trace the output from the rack back to the computer to make sure the output is the same all the way back to the computer.

In the afternoon, we check the clearance of the model support system and surrounding cover plates. We move the model down to the tunnel floor and check the clearance of the support as it goes below the cover plates. As the model nears the floor, the back part of the large support structure has a few items that may hit the cover plates. The Technicians mark the cover plates, so they cut out those areas. While they are cutting into 1/4 inch aluminum plates, other Technicians are working on the models to get them ready. In the meantime, I write in the test log what occurred with the instrument problem and the cutting of the cover plates. As Iam typing, I get a telephone call from the Test Engineer that will cover the second shift. He will not be coming in because his daughter went into labor and is expecting to the deliver her third child, real soon. I called the other Test Engineer who cover the third shift to see if he could come in 4 hours earlier and I would work 4 hours more to cover the second shift. When the third shift Test Engineer comes in, I update him on what has happened and what else needs to be done. The end of another test day, one day of over 4000 different day. Now it's time to go home and relax after a long 12 hour shift!!