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The Pilot Group
clientele includes universities,
research, medical and industrial organizations, such as
Allergan, NASA/JPL, Ophthalmic Innovations International,
Pratt and Whitney, The Boeing Company, The Carnegie Institution
of Washington, US National Observatory, University of Washington,
U.C. Santa Cruz / Lick Observatory, Wise Observatory and
many others.
About
the President
Alan Schier founded The Pilot Group in 1990, although he
has been doing similar work since the time he could walk.
This natural predisposition toward technical endeavors led
first to an automotive repair business, and then to a Bachelor's
and Master's of Science in Engineering from Stanford University
in 1986, complete with academic accolades including the
F.E. Terman Engineering Award, Rotary Foundation Scholarship,
election to the Tau Beta Pi engineering honor society and
election to the Phi Beta Kappa liberal arts honor society.
His short history as an employee elsewhere has also yielded
honors including the Finnigan Corporation Award for Engineering
Excellence, several NASA Tech Brief Awards, and Published
articles in the area of spacecraft control.
Since founding
The Pilot Group, Mr.Schier has achieved significant accomplishments
in servicing the needs of his clients. These include:
- In 1996,
the world's largest digital servo control system used
for the two hydraulic snakes in the movie "Anaconda",
each having 120 coupled degrees of freedom.
- Opto-mechanical
design for some of the world's largest spectrograph optics
used on the Keck telescope.
- Design and
fabrication of the highest performance gas pressure control
system in regular industrial use. It is accurate to 0.1
psi over a 1000psi range, with a resolution better than
0.02 psi.
- Design and
fabrication of the world's fastest research telescope
mount, used in the RAPTOR and ROTSE programs.
Mr. Schier speaks
fluent German, some French, sang Bass in an award-winning
acapella group, and can, in theory, play the piano.
Facilities
and Equipment List
The Pilot Group facilities include approximately 1,000 square
foot office, 2,500 square foot lab and shop area in a company-owned
10,800 square foot building.
Machining
and Fabrication Equipment
- Allis-Chalmers
3000 lb. forklift
- Baldor diamond
grinder
- Bendmore 12"
sheet metal brake
- Boyar-Schultz
612 surface grinder
- Buffalo drill
press
- Dake 5-ton
press
- Diacro 24"
shear
- Hein-Werner
2-ton mobile crane
- Husky 7.5
hp compressor, 175 psi
- Lux-Matter
13" x 40" (19" through gap) lathe
- Miller 250DX
TIG/stick welder, 325 amps
- Miller Spectrum
2050 plasma cutter, 75 amps
- Oxy-acetylene
torch
- Shizuoka CNC
vertical mill, 18" x 38"
Metrology
and Alignment Equipment
- Assorted shop
optics and fixturing
- Dover 10"
air-bearing spindle
- Fowler 100
mm indicator, 2 mm resolution, 4 mm accuracy
- Grade A gage
blocks to 14-inches long
- Meiji stereo/trinocular
zoom microscope
- Mitutoyo 30-inch
height gage
- Mitutoyo F604
CMM
- Mitutoyo LVDT
gage head, 0.1 mm resolution
- Nikon measuring
microscope
- Scherr-Tumico
14” comparator
- Starrett 1.5"
to 28" inside micrometer
- Starrett 24"
Master Caliper, 0.001" accuracy
- Yuasa precision
12" rotary table
- Various indicators,
micrometers, and calipers with resolutions and accuracies
in the range of 0.0001" to 0.001”.
Optical
Assembly and Test Equipment
- 12" f/10
Schmidt-Cass collimator
- 16" f/4.5
parabolic collimator
- Assorted optical
and IR filters
- Assorted precision
pinholes
- Assorted light
sources, including halogen and fiber optic
- Brunson 83
autocollimating alignment telescope
- Custom focal
length and resolution bench
- Eidolon nodal
slide MTF bench
- Laminar flow
bench
- Newport RP
Reliance 36” x 72” vibration isolated optical
table
- NRC 36"
x 48" vibration isolated optical table
- Pulnix TM7-CN
CCD
- Welch vane-type
vacuum pump
- Wyko Phase
II interferometer
Electrical
and Electronic Equipment
- Assorted bench
power supplies
- Fluke 87 III
DVM
- General Microwave
454A microwave power meter
- HP 5345 frequency
counter
- Rutherford
816 pulse generator
- Tektronix
7403 analog oscilloscope
- Tektronix
FG504 signal generator
- Tektronix
TDS3012B digital storage oscilloscope
- Wire-wrap,
soldering, and prototyping equipment
Computing
and Software
- AutoCAD (CAD)
- Algor (finite
element analysis)
- Inventor (solid
modeling)
- MathCad (numerical
computation and analysis)
- Matlab (numerical
computation and analysis)
- Mechanical
Desktop (solid modeling)
- Vellum (CAD)
- Zemax EE (ray
tracing)
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