Device for determining the rotation angle of a shaft in an aircraft
AssigneeAirbus Deutschland GmbH
InventorJoern Rennhack
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
Nowadays position pickup units are commonly used in order to measure the rotation position of a shaft for operating a landing flap or landing slat or a brake flap in an aircraft. In the case of failure of such a position pickup unit (PPU) the corresponding drive motor of the shaft has to be switched off because position data is no longer present. According to one embodiment of the present invention a device for determining the rotation angle of a shaft in an aircraft is stated, with said device comprising a shaft and a motor, wherein rotation of the shaft is measured by way of the motor. This measuring data can be evaluated together with the data of the PPU. In this way improved system availability is ensured.
Claims9
A device for determining the rotation angle of a shaft in an aircraft, the device comprising:
- a shaft designed for operating a device, the device selected from the group consisting of a brake flap, a landing flap, a landing slat, a rudder, an aileron and an elevator;
- a motor, which rotates the shaft and to detect first rotation data that correspond to a first rotation angle of a first region of the shaft, and wherein the motor is designed to carry out said detection in an absolute manner;
- a position pickup unit designed to detect second rotation data that correspond to a second rotation angle of a second region of the shaft;
- and
- a synchronisation unit designed to synchronise the first rotation data with the second rotation data.
A method for determining the rotation angle of a shaft in an aircraft, comprising the steps of:
- rotating the shaft by a motor;
- detecting first rotation data that correspond to a first rotation angle of a first region of the shaft, by the motor in an absolute manner;
- detecting second rotation data that corresponds to a second rotation angle of a second region of the shaft, by a position pickup unit;
- and
- synchronising the first rotation data with the second rotation data.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.