Thierry Dubois for Aviation Week
Aircraft seating manufacturers adopt a “less is more” attitude with low-part-count solutions that promise savings in weight, cost and upkeep.
“It is generally assumed that sophistication equals results, brilliance and performance, but does it really?” Rachel Barnett, head of Marketing at Acro Aircraft Seating, asks rhetorically.
A look at the pared-down designs of the manufacturer’s Series 3 and Series 6 seats sums up her position.
“Our design philosophy is to keep things simple and to eliminate unnecessary layers,” Barnett says.
But in order to do so, designers and engineers must first understand the elements that are essential to the integrity of the seat: For Acro, these are comfort, robustness and maintainability. “These factors are interlinked, and when we combine them all, we ultimately end up with a seat that achieves a low cost of ownership.”
One of the layers Acro eschews is the seatback shroud. “We allow the engineering features, such as the ribs, to be visible rather than covering them, and therefore we develop the design to meet objectives related to functionality, weight, cost and aesthetics,” Barnett says.
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