Aircraft engine
AssigneeGeneral Electric Company
InventorsBrendan Michael Freely, Kurt David Murrow, Michael James McMahon
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method of operating an aircraft engine coupled to a wing of an aircraft including: setting a pitch of a plurality of rotor blades of a rotor assembly of the aircraft engine at non-uniform pitch angles along a circumferential direction of the aircraft engine such that the plurality of rotor blades define a first pitch at a first position and a second pitch at a second position, wherein the second position is 180 degrees offset from the first position, and wherein the first pitch is different from the second pitch.
Claims20
A method of operating an aircraft engine coupled to a wing of an aircraft comprising:
- setting a pitch of a plurality of rotor blades of a rotor assembly of the aircraft engine at non-uniform pitch angles along a circumferential direction of the aircraft engine such that the plurality of rotor blades define a first pitch at a first position and a second pitch at a second position, wherein the second position is 180 degrees offset from the first position, and wherein the first pitch is different from the second pitch.
An aircraft engine defining a circumferential direction, the aircraft engine comprising:
- a turbomachine;
- a rotor assembly comprising a plurality of rotor blades driven by the rotor assembly;
- a pitch change mechanism operable with the plurality of rotor blades for changing a pitch of the plurality of rotor blades;
- and
- a controller operably connected to the pitch change mechanism and configured to set a pitch of the plurality of rotor blades through the pitch change mechanism at non-uniform pitch angles along the circumferential direction such that the plurality of rotor blades define a first pitch at a first position and a second pitch at a second position, wherein the second position is 180 degrees offset from the first position, and wherein the first pitch is different from the second pitch.
An aircraft comprising:
- a wing;
- an engine coupled to the wing and defining a circumferential direction, the engine comprising:
- a turbomachine;
- a rotor assembly comprising a plurality of rotor blades driven by the rotor assembly, the plurality of rotor blades extending at least partially over a top of the wing when in a first position and at least partially below a bottom of the wing when in a second position;
- a pitch change mechanism operable with the plurality of rotor blades for changing a pitch of the plurality of rotor blades;
- and
- a controller operably connected to the pitch change mechanism and configured to set a pitch of the plurality of rotor blades through the pitch change mechanism at non-uniform pitch angles along the circumferential direction such that the plurality of rotor blades define a first pitch at the first position and a second pitch at the second position wherein the first pitch is different from the second pitch.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.