What is HAL ?

One of the largest aerospace companies in Asia, HAL has annual turnover of over US$2 billion. More than 40% of HAL's revenues come from international deals to manufacture aircraft engines, spare parts, and other aircraft materials. A partial list of major operations undertaken by HAL includes the following:

HAL LCH though light in its configuration is pretty well armoured to protect itself against 12.7 mm and 7.62 mm rounds. ​Light weight Ceramic Faced Composite Armour Panels for Advanced Light Helicopter and Mi-17-IV helicopter have successfully undergone integration and flight-trials. This provides protection to aircrews and critical parts of helicopter against hits of bullets of 12.7 mm AP.

Composite laminates were made using kevlar fabric as reinforcement and modified epoxy resin for matrix. Kevlar-epoxy composite laminates of different thicknesses were prepared by compression moulding process. Kevlar-epoxy composite laminates were bonded with alumina ceramic cylindrical pellets with the help of epoxy structural adhesive. Gaps between the ceramic pellets were filled with modified epoxy resin.

HAL LCH carries many aerodynamic changes to reduce drag and flight performances which was highlighted during prototypes stage. The LCH can fly to extreme angles of 70 degree-80 degree nose down, demonstrating high maneuverability. Dr.Prasad Sampath general manager of RWDC, claimed the LCH , “probabaly the most agile design in the world because of its rotor”.

Definition - What does Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) mean?
A hardware abstraction layer (HAL) is a logical division of code that serves as an abstraction layer between a computer's physical hardware and its software. It provides a device driver interface allowing a program to communicate with the hardware.

The main purpose of a HAL is to conceal different hardware architectures from the OS by providing a uniform interface to the system peripherals.

A hardware abstraction layer is included in many OSs to avoid modifying the OS kernel to run the program on computers with varying hardware architecture.

A PC may include the HAL in the OS kernel or in the form of device drivers that provide a consistent interface for applications to interact with the hardware peripherals.

The HAL provides the following benefits:

Allowing applications to extract as much performance out of the hardware devices as possible
Enabling the OS to perform regardless of the hardware architecture
Enabling device drivers to provide direct access to each hardware device, which allows programs to be device-independent
Allowing software programs to communicate with the hardware devices at a general level
Facilitating portability

Hindustan Aeronautics Limited(HAL) is India’s #1 public sector company in aircraft design, manufacturing and maintenance. HAL is the major vendor for Indian Airforce and Indian Navy.

HAL is monopoly in Defense aircraft manufacturing. HAL also major vendor for ISRO(Indian Space research and Organisation) building their space products. HAL has it’s headquarters in Bangalore and with it’s division of specializations spread across in India at different locations.

HAL is an Aeronautics manufacturing organization. Currently the main highlighted aircraft that HAL is working upon is LCA Tejas, as it is one of the indigenous project of the country.

2. More appropriately known as the "HAL 9000," HAL is the name of the artificial intelligent computer in the 1968 Science Fiction movie 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Fun Fact: The name "HAL" is each letter before the word "IBM."

The HAL Dhruv is a utility helicopter developed and manufactured by India's Hindustan Aeronautics Limited (HAL). The development of the Dhruv was first announced in November 1984, and it was subsequently designed with assistance from MBB in Germany.

The helicopter first flew in 1992; however, its development was prolonged due to multiple factors including the Indian Army's requirement for design changes, budget restrictions, and sanctions placed on India following the 1998 Pokhran-II nuclear tests.

The Dhruv entered service in 2002. It is designed to meet the requirement of both military and civil operators, with military variants of the helicopter being developed for the Indian Armed Forces, while a variant for civilian/commercial use has also been developed. The helicopter was first exported to Nepal and Israel

Military versions in production include transport, utility, reconnaissance and medical evacuation variants. Based on the Dhruv platform, the HAL Light Combat Helicopter (LCH) a dedicated attack helicopter and HAL Light Utility Helicopter (LUH), a utility and observation helicopter, are currently being developed.

As of August 2013, more than 200 HAL Dhruv have been produced for different customers.

The Advanced Light Helicopter (ALH) program for an indigenous 5-ton multirole helicopter was initiated in May 1979 by the Indian Air Force and Indian Naval Air Arm. HAL were given a contract by the Indian government in 1984 to develop the helicopter; Germany's Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm (MBB) were contracted in July 1984 as a design consultant and collaborative partner on the programme.

Although originally scheduled to fly in 1989, the first prototype ALH (Z-3182) made its maiden flight on 20 August 1992 at Bangalore with the then-Indian Vice President K R Narayanan in attendance.[10] This was followed by a second prototype (Z-3183) on 18 April 1993, an Army/Air Force version (Z-3268), and a navalised prototype (IN.901) with Allied Signal CTS800 engines and a retractable tricycle undercarriage.