Landing gear with composite leaf spring
AssigneeAirbus UK Limited
InventorRobert Ian Thompson
Life of this patent
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Abstract
An aircraft landing gear comprising: an arm mounted to a pivot and carrying one or more wheel assemblies; and a composite leaf spring which is coupled to the arm and arranged to provide a resilient biasing force which opposes rotation of the arm about the pivot. The arm can be made relatively stiff in comparison with the leaf spring, so that load is transferred directly into the pivot without a large amount of bending of the leg. The leaf spring shock absorber typically has a reduced part count compared with a conventional oleo-pneumatic shock absorber. By forming the leaf spring from a composite material, its weight is significantly reduced in comparison with a conventional metal spring, making it suitable for use on a relatively large aircraft.
Claims17
An aircraft landing gear comprising:
- an arm mounted to a pivot and carrying one or more wheel assemblies;
- and a composite leaf spring which is coupled to the arm and arranged to provide a resilient biasing force which opposes rotation of the arm about the pivot.
A method of absorbing landing loads of an aircraft, the method comprising:
- contacting the ground with one or more wheel assemblies carried by an arm which is mounted to a pivot;
- rotating the arm about the pivot with the landing loads;
- and opposing rotation of the arm about the pivot with a composite leaf spring which is coupled to the arm.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.