Smart Intelligent Aircraft Structures

The term smart structures is commonly used for structures which have the
ability to adapt to environmental conditions according to the design
requirements. As a rule, the adjustments are designed and performed in
order to increase the efficiency or safety of the structure. Combining smart
structures
with
the
sophistication
achieved
in materials
science, information
technology,
measurement
science, sensors, actuators, signal
processing, nanotechnology, cybernetics, artificial
intelligence,
and biomimetics, one can talk about Smart Intelligent Structures. In other
words, structures which are able to sense their environment, self-diagnose
their condition and adapt in such a way so as to make the design more
useful and efficient.
The concept of Smart Intelligent Aircraft Structures offers significant
improvements in aircraft total weight, manufacturing cost and, above all,
operational cost by an integration of system tasks into the load carrying
structure. It also helps to improve the aircrafts life cycle and reduce its
maintenance. Individual morphing concepts also have the ability to
decrease airframe generated noise and hence reduce the effect of air traffic
noise near airports. Furthermore, cruise drag reductions have a positive
effect on fuel consumptionand required take-off fuel load.
Morphing structures
Fixed geometry wings are optimized for a
single
design
point,
identified
through altitude, Mach number, weight, etc.
Their development is always a compromise
between design and off-design points,
referred to a typical mission. This is
emphasised for civil aircraft where flight
profiles are almost standard. Nevertheless, it
may occur to fly at high speeds and low
altitude with light weight over a short
stretch or to fly at low speeds and high altitude with maximum load for a
longer range. The lift coefficient would then range between 0.08 and
0.4, with the aircraft experiencing up to 30% weight reduction as the fuel is
consumed. These changes could be compensated by wing camber
variations, to pursue optimal geometry for any flight condition, thus
improving aerodynamic and structural performance
Existing aircraft cannot change shape without aerodynamic gaps, something
that can be solved with Smart Intelligent Structures. By ensuring the
detailed consideration of structural needs throughout the entire lifetime of
an aircraft and focusing on the structural integration of needed past
capabilities, Smart Intelligent Aircraft Structures will allow aircraft designers
to seriously consider conformal morphing technologies. The reduced drag

during take-off, cruise and landing for future and ecologically improved civil
aircraft wings can be achieved through naturally laminar wing technology,
by incorporating a gapless and deformable leading edge device with lift
providing capability. Such a morphing structure typically consists of a
flexible outer skin and an internal driving mechanism (Figure 1). Current
aircraft designs already employ winglets aimed at increasing the cruise
flight efficiency by induced drag reduction. Smart intelligent Structures
propose
a
state
of
the
art
technology
that
incorporates
a wingtip active trailing edge, which could be a means of reducing winglet
and wing loads at key flight conditions.
Structural health monitoring
Another component of an intelligent aircraft structure is the ability to
sense and diagnose potential threats to its structural integrity. This differs
from conventional non-destructive testing (NDT) by the fact that Structural
Health Monitoring (SHM) uses sensors that are permanently bonded or
embedded in the structure. Composite materials, which are highly
susceptible to hidden internal flaws which may occur during manufacturing
and processing of the material or while the structure is subjected to service
loads, require a substantial amount of inspection and defect monitoring at
regular intervals. Thus, the increasing use of composite materials for aircraft
primary structure aircraft components increases substantially their life cycle
cost. According to some estimates, over 25% of the life cycle cost of an
aircraft or aerospace structure, which includes pre-production, production,
and post-production costs, can be attributed to operation and support,
involving inspection and maintenance. With sensing technology reducing in
cost, size and weight, and sensor signal processing power continuously
increasing, a variety of approaches have been developed allowing
integration of such sensing options onto or into structural components.
Although available in principle, none of these SHM technologies have
currently achieved a sufficient level of maturity such that SHM could be
reliably applied to real engineering structures. A real reduction of life cycle
costs related to maintenance and inspections can only be achieved by SHM
systems designed as fail-safe components and included within a damage
tolerance assessment scenario, able to reduce the inspection times (or their
intervals) by investigating the structure quickly and reliably and avoiding
the time consuming disassembly of structural parts.
Multifunctional materials
The advantages of carbon fibre reinforced polymers (CFRPs) over metallic
materials in terms of specific stiffness and strength are well known. In the
last few years, there has been a sharp increase in the demand for composite
materials with integrated multifunctional capabilities for use in aeronautical
structures.

However, a major drawback with CFRPs for primary structural applications is

their low toughness and damage tolerance. Epoxy resins are brittle and
have poor impact strength and resistance to crack propagation, resulting in
unsatisfactory levels of robustness and reliability. This results in designs with
large margins of safety and complex inspection operations. In addition, by
increasing the relative fraction of composite components within new aircraft,
challenges regarding electrical conductivity have arisen such as lightning
strike protection, static
discharge, electrical
bonding and grounding,
interference shielding and current return through the structure. These
drawbacks can be solved by the use of emerging technologies such
as nanocomposites, which combine mechanical, electrical and thermal
properties.
Nanoparticle reinforced resins have been found to offer two distinct
advantages over current resin systems. First of all, they are able to provide
an increase in fracture toughness of up to 50% for older liquid resin infusion
(LRI) resins and 30% in more advanced systems. Secondly, percolated
nanoparticles drastically improve resin conductivity, turning it from a perfect
isolator into a semiconductor. While improved damage tolerance properties
could directly lead to structural weight savings, the exploitation of electrical
properties could also enable a simpler, and hence cheaper, Electrical
Structure Network (ESN).
Running research activities to implement the above technologies to
aircraft
Developing these technologies for future A/C, there is currently (2011
2015) a running project, partially funded by the European Commission,
called SARISTU (Smart Intelligent Aircraft Structures) with a total budget
of 51,000,000. This initiative is coordinated by Airbus and brings together
64 partners from 16 European countries.[13][14]SARISTU focuses on the
cost reduction of air travel through a variety of individual applications as
well as their combination. Specifically, the integration of different conformal
morphing concepts in a laminar wing is intended to improve aircraft
performance through a 6% drag reduction, with a positive effect on fuel
consumption and required take-off fuel load. A side effect will be a decrease
of up to 6dB(A) of the airframe generated noise, thus reducing the impact of
air traffic noise in the vicinity of airports. Recent calculations
and Computational Fluid Dynamics Analysis indicate that the target is likely
to be exceeded but will still need to be offset against a possible weight
penalty.
Another expected outcome is to limit the integration cost of Structural
Health Monitoring (SHM) systems by moving the system integration as far
forward in the manufacturing chain as possible. In this manner, SHM
integration becomes a feasible concept to enable in-service inspection cost
reductions of up to 1%. Structural Health Monitoring related trials indicate
that specific aircraft inspections may gain higher benefits than originally
anticipated.

Finally, the incorporation of Carbon Nanotubes into aeronautical resins is

expected to enable weight savings of up to 3% when compared to the
unmodified skin/stringer/frame system, while a combination of technologies
is expected to decrease Electrical Structure Network installation costs by up
to 15%.