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This month's meeting will give an insight into the use of Acorn computers in testing life-critical aerospace applications, from consumer facing business to government and military.

Computer based testing was a growing part of industry through the 70s, 80s and 90s. Replacing the whim of a tester with programmed tolerances both improved the quality and safety of deployments, but also increased speed and breadth of production. Keith Emerton, a retired Senior Specialist Test Equipment Engineer, explains how Acorn Computers were (and still are) used to conduct tests on core parts of aircraft systems.

The talk will discuss life before Acorn and computer testing, looking at the state of industry. Keith will then explain why he and a team of engineers decided that only Acorn could deliver the reliability and longevity required for improving such tasks. C.A.T.E, as the BBC Micro, Archimedes and latterly A7000 driven test equipment was affectionately known, was to become the standard in testing Airbus planes, the Chinook helicopter, and numerous other aircraft world-wide.

Finally, Keith will explain why, after 30 years, Acorn equipment is still used in the tests, and only now are these solid reliable workhorses being analysed and reverse-engineered to create a modern equivalent.