Method and apparatus for minimizing dynamic structural loads of an aircraft
AssigneeEADS Deutschland GmbH
InventorAndreas Wildschek
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A method of dynamically alleviating loads generated on an aircraft by a disturbance of gust and/or turbulence. The method comprises monitoring, during flight of the aircraft, to automatically detect a disturbance due to gust and/or turbulence and determining an incidence angle or angle of attack of the disturbance. When a disturbance due to gust and/or turbulence is detected, automatically generating control commands for deflecting control surfaces dependent on the incidence angle or angle of attack, and applying the control commands to deflect the control surfaces.
Claims20
An apparatus for dynamically alleviating loads generated on an aircraft, comprising:
- a sensor configured to automatically detect a disturbance due to gust and provide a parameter representing the angle of attack of the disturbance;
- a control command generator configured to automatically generating control commands for deflecting a control surface dependent on the angle of attack;
- first actuators configured to activate first control surfaces responsive to the control commands and second actuators configured to deflect second control surfaces, the control command generator being configured to generate first control commands for actuating the first control surfaces and second control commands for deflecting the second control surfaces;
- and
- a comparator configured to compare the angle of attack with a predetermined value, the control command generator being configured to generate the first control command when the angle of attack is below or equal to the predetermined value and to generate the second control command when the angle of attack is above the predetermined value.
An apparatus for dynamically alleviating loads generated on an aircraft by a disturbance, comprising:
- a sensor configured to automatically detect a disturbance due to gust and provide a parameter representing the angle of attack of the disturbance;
- and
- a controller including a control command generator configured to automatically generating control commands to deflect a control surface dependent on the angle of attack, and control allocation logic to adapt the control commands to the amount of the angle of attack and to a gust length representing a duration of the gust over time.
A method of dynamically alleviating loads generated on an aircraft by a disturbance, the method comprising:
- monitoring, during flight of the aircraft, to automatically detect a disturbance due to at least one of gust and turbulence and determine an angle of attack of the disturbance;
- when the disturbance is detected, automatically generating control commands to deflect control surfaces dependent on the angle of attack in order to dynamically alleviate loads generated on the aircraft by the disturbance;
- applying the control commands to deflect the control surfaces accordingly;
- and
- adapting the control commands based on an amount of the angle of attack and a gust length representing a duration of the gust over time to adapt the deflection of the control surfaces both to the angle of attack and the gust length.
A method of dynamically alleviating loads generated on an aircraft by a disturbance, the method comprising:
- monitoring, during flight of the aircraft, to automatically detecting a disturbance due to at least one of gust and turbulence and determine an angle of attack of the disturbance;
- when the disturbance is detected, automatically generating control commands to deflect control surfaces dependent on the angle of attack in order to dynamically alleviate loads generated on the aircraft by the disturbance, the generating of the control commands comprising
- generating first control commands for first control surfaces and second control commands for second control surfaces;
- comparing the angle of attack with a predetermined value;
- generating the first control commands to activate the first control surface when the angle of attack is below or equal to this predetermined value;
- and
- generating the second control commands to add a deflection of the second control surfaces when the angle of attack is above the predetermined value;
- and
- applying the control commands to deflect the control surfaces accordingly.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.