Planetary gearbox system and method for operating a planetary gearbox system
AssigneeRolls-Royce Deutschland Ltd & Co KG
InventorHannes Wuestenberg
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Abstract
A planetary gearbox system with a ring gear, a sun gear, a carrier and planetary gears as parts in a geared aircraft turbofan engine, with one static part of the parts being in rest under nominal operation and with a kinematic switch device for decoupling the static part to become a rotatable part or with a kinematic switch device for coupling the rotatable part to become a static part. The invention also relates to a method for operating a planetary gearbox system.
Claims20
A planetary gearbox system of a geared aircraft turbofan engine, comprising:
- a plurality of parts including:
- a ring gear,
- a sun gear,
- a carrier,
- planetary gears,
- at least one kinematic switch device,
- wherein a static part of the plurality of parts is in rest under nominal operation,
- wherein the at least one kinematic switch device is suitable for at least one chosen from:
- decoupling the static part to become rotatable, and
- coupling a rotatable part of the plurality of parts to become static,
- wherein the at least one kinematic switch device comprises two connecting parts and a position change mechanism to automatically trigger a position change in at least one of the two connecting parts relative to at least one chosen from the other of the two connecting parts and an engine part, from a first position into a second position in dependence of a non-nominal torque or a reversal in a direction of a torque effective on at least one chosen from one of the two connecting parts and the engine part, and
- wherein the position change mechanism comprises at least one chosen from a helical spline connection between the two connecting parts, an explosive bolt device, an automatic clutch device and a hydraulic device,
- wherein the two connecting parts are directly connected to at least one chosen from a shaft and the ring gear.
A method for operating a planetary gearbox system with a ring gear, a sun gear, a carrier and planetary gears as a plurality of parts in a geared aircraft turbofan engine, wherein a static part of the plurality of parts is in rest under nominal operation and the static part is decoupled with a kinematic switch device to become rotatable or a rotatable part is coupled with a kinematic switch device to become static,
- wherein the kinematic switch device comprises two connecting parts and a position change mechanism to automatically trigger a position change in at least one of the two connecting parts relative to at least one chosen from the other of the two connecting parts and an engine part, from a first position into a second position in dependence of a non-nominal torque or a reversal in a direction of a torque effective on at least one chosen from one of the two connecting parts and the engine part, and
- wherein the position change mechanism comprises at least one chosen from a helical spline connection between the two connecting parts, an explosive bolt device, an automatic clutch device and a hydraulic device,
- wherein the two connecting parts are directly connected to at least one chosen from a shaft and the ring gear.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.