Experience

Rotating Composite Technologies, LLC

• United States
• Aviation and Aerospace Component Manufacturing
• 1 - 100 Employee

• Retired

  • Apr 2018 - Present

• Vice President and Chief of Operations

  • 2007 - Present

  One of the Founders of the Rotating Composite Technologies (RCT) aircraft composite propulsor business (e.g. propellers, ducted fans, lift rotors, variable pitch turbofans, and other highly loaded rotating structural components). Much of the RCT technology was first developed and proven out in AeroComposites (ACI), which proceeded RCT (ACI information follows) having the same Founders and Officers as RCT. My business partner in ACI and RCT, John Violette (President of both ACI and RCT), is the propulsor expert in these two businesses. John previously spent a highly successful career with United Technologies Corporation (UTC - Hamilton Sundstrand Division) working on the design of composite propellers/rotors for both large commercial and military aircraft. Over the years, AeroComposites (ACI) established valuable business relationships with many General Aviation (GA) aircraft manufacturing companies in proving out the value of ACI's propeller technology flying successfully on a wide variety of GA experimental category aircraft with perfect safety record. In 2007, RCT was founded and in turn licensed the rights from ACI for its proprietary and patent protected composite design technology. Shortly thereafter, RCT signed a long term strategic Patent License Agreement with Textron Corporation for world-wide use of RCT's licensed technology for use on General Aviation FAA Certified aircraft. Since that time, RCT has gone on to develop many composite propulsors (propellers, ducted fans, lift rotors) under contract from major aerospace corporations for both Commercial and Military type aircraft applications including both Manned and Unmanned Air Vehicles (UAV's) that are being designed/produced by a number of the world's largest aerospace corporations that include Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Sikorsky Aircraft, Boeing, Piasecki Aircraft, Hamilton Sundstrand, and Pratt & Whitney.



AeroComposites, Inc.

• Kensington, CT

• Vice President & Chief of Operations

  • 1999 - Present

  One of the Founders of AeroComposites, Inc (General Aviation (GA) composite propeller business) in 1999. Actively participated in all aspects of the business including Strategic Business Planning, Recruitment, Training, Engineering Management, Manufacturing Process Development, Subcontractor Procurement, New Business Development and Marketing, and Customer Support. Over the years, AeroComposites (ACI) established many valuable business relationships with General Aviation (GA) aircraft manufacturing companies in proving out the value of ACI's patented propellor technology. In 2008, ACI licensed its propeller technology for General Aviation applications to a newly formed Rotating Composite Technologies (RCT) company. In turn, RCT signed a long term Strategic License Agreement with Textron Corporation for world-wide use of its licensed propeller technology for a new generation of composite propellers for General Aviation FAA Certified aircraft. Finally, one of the notable aircraft that ACI built propellers for was the Sikorsky X2 Demonstrator, a program/aircraft that went on to win the prestigious National Collier Award in 2010 in the United States, for the "most innovative aerospace achievement in the year 2010". It turns out that in 2010, this was the 100th Collier Award to be awarded where the first Collier Award was given out in 1910.



Aerosance, Inc

• Farmington, Connecticut

• Vice President & Chief of Marketing

  • Jan 1997 - Nov 1999

  One of four Founders of Aerotronics, Inc, a new General Aviation electronic piston engine controls business. Participated in most aspects of the business including Business Development, Recruitment, Training, Manufacturing Process Development and Test, FAA Certification Program, Setup for Manufacturing, New Business Development, Marketing and Sales, and Customer Support. Early in the Aerotronics business, the company and its piston engine electronic controls with cockpit display technology was acquired by Teledyne Continental Motors (TCM) located in Mobile, AL. TCM is a major and premier General Aviation company that manufactures FAA Certified piston aircraft engines being a division of Teledyne Technologies Corporation (TTI) based in Los Angelos, CA. Aerotronics proceeded to design and develop 1) highly adaptable smart piston engine controls (e.g. ignition and fuel injection) system, and 2) engine diagnostic data cockpit display for the cockpit pilot/crew. Both of these electronic systems were then FAA Certified and put into manufacture by TCM. Following FAA Certification, the Aerotronics company was sold by TCM parent company, Teledyne Technologies Corporation (Los Angeles, CA), to AVIC Aviation Corporation located in China.



Connecticut Technology Consortium, Inc

• Kensington, Connecticut

• Vice President & Engineering Manager

  • Jan 1997 - Nov 1999

  One of two Founders of Connecticut Technology Consortium (CTC). The focus of this company was 1) the design, manufacture, and delivery of speciality spare parts required by the US Navy for its nuclear submarine fleet, where certain parts were no longer being manufactured and supplied to the Navy by previous vendors, and 2) the redesign and manufacture of small attitude control satellite thrusters (hot gas), no longer available from an earlier supplier, for use on a new generation of US Navy satellites ["High Resolution Imaging Survellance Satellites (EARLYBIRD 1)"]. More specifically, an Attitude Control Thruster Contract for satellites was awarded to CTC from the US Naval Research Labratory in Washington D.C. to supply a thruster system for use on a new military survellance satellite designed to take select high resolution pictures of earth targets/objects from space. In support of this program, CTC designed and built a large vacuum chamber with computer and software controls and propellant delivery system. Following this Program for the US Navy, CTC sold its business to a precision design and machining company in the North East part of the United States, with which it had teamed on the program for other components of the propulstion system.



Hamilton Sundstrand

• United States
• Aviation and Aerospace Component Manufacturing
• 700 & Above Employee

• Engineering Manager & Chief Engineer

  • 1972 - 1997

  Experience included a wide variety of responsibilities including Business Development, Systems Engineering, and Senior Management responsibilities for prime customers that included NASA, US Navy, and the US Air Force. New technology applications with these customers included tasks involving engineering hardware design, development, test, manufacture, and FAA or equivalent Certifications for the US Military. More specifically, hardware systems were developed for applications that included the US Space Shuttle, International Space Station (ISS), US Astronaut Extravehicular Space Suit (EMU), Northrop B2 Bomber, US Nuclear Submarines, and Propulsion & Attitude Control Systems for numerous Military and Scientific Satellites. Critical problems were solved that often required development and use of special materials and processes such as electronic sensor hermetic packaging to avoid moisture corrosion induced problems in manned life support system applications. Assignment's also included participation in "NASA Space Walk/Work Task simulated training for Astronauts", as an engineering support Scuba Diver supporting Space Suited Astronauts in the Neutral Buoyancy NASA Large Water Tank Space Suit Training Facility in Huntsville, AL. This astronaut simulated space suited work operations training was required for the eventual conduct of satellite service/maintenance tasks in space by astronauts (e.g. assembling/repairing satellites and/or repairs to the Space Shuttle, Hubble Space Telescope, ect., in Earth Orbit operating in the hard vacuum and weightlessness of space).



National Patent Development Corporation

• Assignment: Cambridge, Massachusetts (close to MIT)

• Director of Technology at National Patent Development Corporation (NPDC, Located in New York City)

  • 1970 - 1972

  Hired as Director of New Technology (3 year assignment) - Responsible for successfully managing a design, development, and test program for a new innovative photovoltaic sun tracking and renewable solar energy system (perhaps the first of its kind in the world). Located and set up a development laboratory in a rented facility near MIT (Cambridge, Mass.), hired MIT graduate engineers (also supported by MIT Faculty in Material Science Research), built a large multiple solar collector test stand on the flat roof of the rental facility, worked with American Optical Company to develop manufacturing techniques for producing the required highly reflective coated glass mirror/collector's (e.g. helped develop oven sagged plate glass mirror method) for mirror use in the solar system, and managed a team of recently graduated MIT engineers (electrical, materials, and mechanical) to accomplish work including the programming of a sun tracking microprocessor (i.e. rudimentary computer microprocessor by today's standards) to control solar mirror tracking (e.g. included "wakeup and sun tracking" algorithims) of the solar collector mirror system. Completed the assignment by giving solar energy system talks/demonstrations to potential "Wall Street" investors that led to raising of Capital Funds for the next commercialization phase of the prototype renewable energy system. The Solar Project was deemed successful and was later sold off by NPDC to an "Investor Group" for the next stage of development.



Pratt & Whitney

• United States
• Aviation and Aerospace Component Manufacturing
• 700 & Above Employee

• Analytical Engineer & Group Engineering Manager

  • 1960 - 1970

  Scientific Analysis Group - Performed engineering research to create a computer program for use in designing compressor and turbine blades/rotors in turbofan engines. Worked with Dr. Paul Garabedian and Dr. David Korn, faculty/consultants from New York University, in developing and applying their analytical methods for the design of transonic shockless airfoils for Pratt & Whitney turbine engines. Compressor Group - Developed a first ever, Laser Test Measurement System (Laser Velocimetry System) for measuring air velocity field vectors within rotating passages between fan rotor blades. Conducted fan rotor tests and wrote a report on this emerging instrumentation method to be used in verifying, based on real acquired data, new analytical design tools being developed for jet engine rotor/fan airfoils. Worked with a co-engineer and friend, Edward Greitzer, (Ed today is Professor Emeritus at MIT and is an expert who is renowned for his work on developing turbofan engine technology) in studying phenomenon associated with the onset of turbine engine compressor stall. Ed devised a simple test setup where flow data acquired correlated well with theoretical predictions for the onset of jet engine compressor stall. For this experimental work and a follow-on technical paper ("Compressor/Diffuser Interaction with Circumferential Flow Distortion") that Ed and I jointly published, we were awarded the T. Bernard Hall prize in 1976, by Cambridge University in England. Engineering Manager of Supersonic Aerodynamics Group - Manager of a group of analytical aerodynamic design engineers responsible for measuring performance of turbine engine compressor airfoils. Conducting airfoil aerodynamic testing was performed at nearby wind tunnel facility at the United Technologies Research Center. Acquired airfoil performance data was subsequently used in selecting airfoil types for use in new and modified turbine engine compressor designs (e.g. JT9D engine for the Boeing 747).