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US 12,668,378 B1Granted
Systems and methods for repairing aircraft components using geometric adaptive machining
AssigneeGeneral Electric Company
InventorsHilal Senuysal, Donovan Buckley, Henry Ng, Suhas Prabhakar Vaze, Muhittin Caner Eksioglu, Jonathan David Mast, Ngan Ming Lee, Clark Trost, Vysakh Venugopal
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method of reshaping and reconstruction includes removing a deformed portion of a component to define a native component portion and adding a replacement portion to the native component portion. The replacement portion is adaptively machined based on one or more parameters of the native component portion and based on one or more original design parameters of the component.
Claims18
A method of reshaping and reconstructing aircraft components via geometric adaptive machining, the method comprising:
- measuring, using at least one tactile probe or non-tactile vision system, an aircraft component to detect a size and shape of the aircraft component;
- and
- by a computing device configured to control a machining device including a machining tool:
- pre-aligning a coordinate system associated with the aircraft component based on the measuring with a coordinate system of the machining device that controls a path of movement of the machining tool to create an aligned coordinate system;
- selecting, from an electronic database, a geometric model corresponding to a post-machining target size and shape of the aircraft component;
- measuring, using the at least one tactile probe or non-tactile vision system, the aircraft component at multiple points in the aligned coordinate system to identify one or more deviations of the aircraft component from the selected geometric model;
- wherein the measuring of the aircraft component to detect the size and shape of the aircraft component further comprises:
- detecting a distance between one edge of the aircraft component and an opposite edge of the aircraft component to determine an overall length or width of the aircraft component:
- detecting a maximum thickness of the aircraft component;
- and
- detecting at least one designated reference point on the aircraft component to determine an overall shape of the aircraft component;
- in response to identifying the one or more deviations of the aircraft component from the selected geometric model, generating a corrected path of the machining tool;
- and
- causing the machining device to move the machining tool along the generated corrected path of the machining tool to machine the aircraft component.
11 more elements
A system for reshaping and reconstructing an aircraft component via geometric adaptive machining, the system comprising:
- a measurement device configured to detect a size and shape of the aircraft component, wherein the measurement device is a tactile probe or a non-tactile vision system;
- an electronic database storing geometric models corresponding to post-machining target sizes and shapes of aircraft components;
- a machining device including a machining tool and configured to control a path of movement of the machining tool to machine the aircraft component;
- and
- a computing device configured to:
- pre-align a coordinate system associated with the aircraft component with a coordinate system of the machining device to create an aligned coordinate system;
- select, from the electronic database, a geometric model corresponding to a post-machining target size and shape of the aircraft component;
- process measurement data, generated by the measurement device, of the aircraft component at multiple points in the aligned coordinate system, to identify one or more deviations of the aircraft component from the selected geometric model;
- wherein the computing device is further configured to process the measurement data generated via the measurement device to:
- detect a distance between one edge of the aircraft component and an opposite edge of the aircraft component to determine an overall length or width of the aircraft component;
- detect a maximum thickness of the aircraft component;
- and
- detect at least one designated reference point on the aircraft component to determine an overall shape of the aircraft component;
- in response to an identification of the one or more deviations of the aircraft component from the selected geometric model, generate a corrected path of the machining tool;
- and
- cause the machining device to move the machining tool along the generated corrected path of the machining tool to machine the aircraft component.
13 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.