Prognostic health monitoring and jam detection for use with an aircraft

A prognostic health monitoring system for use with an aircraft comprising a power drive unit (PDU) and actuators distributed along right- and left-hand-side (RHS and LHS) wings and driven by torque generated in the PDU to control positions of controllable surfaces via RHS and LHS torque-limiters at each individual one of the actuators distributed along the RHS and LHS wings, respectively, the prognostic health monitoring system comprising:

• RHS and LHS torque monitors disposed at each individual one of the actuators distributed along the RHS and LHS wings, respectively;
• and
• a processing unit which is communicative with each RHS and each LHS torque monitor and configured to perform by way of communications with the RHS and LHS torque monitors:
• real-time monitoring of input torque for each individual one of the actuators distributed along the RHS wing and the LHS wing,
• an analysis of information derived from the real-time monitoring, and
• feedback control of operations of the PDU based on results of the analysis comprising at least one of a modification, a tuning and a definition of torque-limiter (TL) thresholds of each of the RHS and LHS torque-limiters at each individual one of the actuators distributed along the RHS and LHS wings, respectively.