Spoiler
AssigneeAirbus Operations GmbH
InventorDenys Custance
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An aircraft wing including a wing structure supporting a wing cover having an outer aerodynamic surface, and a pop-up spoiler unit including an actuation mechanism and a spoiler coupled to the actuation mechanism. The spoiler is moveable by the actuation mechanism to deploy through an aperture in the wing cover. The pop-up spoiler unit is mounted to the wing structure to be substantially isolated from wing bending deflections. The wing structure has a neutral plane which is substantially neither stretched nor compressed during bending of the wing structure. The pop-up spoiler unit is mounted to the wing structure at only two pin joints each having a respective pin axis about which the pop-up spoiler unit is substantially free to rotate, and each pin axis substantially lies in the neutral plane.
Claims17
An aircraft wing comprising:
- a wing structure supporting a wing cover having an outer aerodynamic surface, wherein the wing structure includes a neutral plane substantially midway between an upper cover of the wing cover and a lower cover of the wing cover,
- a pop-up spoiler unit including an actuation mechanism,
- a spoiler coupled to the actuation mechanism of the pop-up spoiler unit, and
- pin joints substantially in the neutral plane and mounting the pop-up spoiler unit to the wing structure, wherein the pin joints include a first pin joint between a first end of the pop-up spoiler unit and the wing structure and a second pin joint between a second end of the pop-up spoiler and the wing structure;
- wherein the first end and the second end are opposite each other along a spanwise length of the pop-up spoiler unit, and
- wherein the spoiler is moveable by the actuation mechanism to deploy through an aperture in the wing cover.
An aircraft wing comprising:
- a neutral plane substantially midway between an upper cover of the wing cover and a lower cover of the wing cover and extending in a spanwise direction of the aircraft wing and perpendicular to the spanwise direction, wherein the neutral plane is curved along the spanwise direction;
- a wing cover including an upper aerodynamic wing surface and a lower aerodynamic wing surface opposite the upper aerodynamic wing surface;
- a spoiler in the upper aerodynamic wing surface, wherein the spoiler, while at a retracted position, is flush with the upper aerodynamic wing surface and extends out from the upper aerodynamic wing surface while at a deployed position;
- a pop-up spoiler unit including an actuation mechanism between the upper aerodynamic wing surface and the lower aerodynamic wing surface, wherein the pop-up spoiler unit is configured to move the spoiler between the retracted position and the deployed position and the pop-up spoiler unit extends in a spanwise direction between opposing ends of the pop-up spoiler unit;
- and
- joints connecting the pop-up spoiler unit to the spoiler, wherein all of the joints connecting the pop-up spoiler to the spoiler lie substantially in the neutral plane and the joints include end joints each attaching at a respective one of the ends of the pop-up spoiler to a respective internal structure of the aircraft wing.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.