Research on commercial aircraft cabin door moving control by

BLDC motor
CONTENTS

ABSTRACT; This work describes the architecture and modeling to control the movement of commercial
aircraft cabin door using electro-mechanical actuator. An accurate door model system is integrated with BLDC
(brush-less direct current) motor that offers high torque to achieve the motion trajectory. PI (Proportional-integral)
control scheme is incorporated to achieve speed and position control of cabin door. The proposed scheme offer two
salient characteristics: Firstly, the leakage problem of the traditional hydraulic system has been addressed. Secondly,
it substantially reduces the power drawn from the aircraft engine. Finally, the numerical simulation results are
exhibited that prove the efficacy of the proposed strategy.

Keywords:
Cabin door, BLDC, PI, Gear speed reducer, DSP

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

CONTENTS

FIGURES

TABLES

SYMBOLS

CHAPTER 1
Introduction
1.1 Background
With the development of civil aviation and the increasing proportion of air transport, under appropriate conditions,
people are more willing to choose aircraft as a time-saving means of transportation when they travel to a distant
place[1]. For the quality, safety, comfort and economic requirements of civil aircraft are constantly improving,
aircraft manufacturers have applied a large number of advanced controlling technologies, and aircraft are gradually
more multi-electric technology, which is particularly evident in the cabin door controlling system. More sensing
detection and indication is applied on cabin doors, and the cabin door controlling also develops from electric and
hydraulic actuation to full electric controlling [2].

In different parts of the aircraft structure, there are many cabin doors and openings of different shapes, sizes and
functions, such as boarding gates, cargo doors, landing gear doors, emergency exits, and maintenance flaps [3]. As a
key component of the aircraft fuselage structure, one of the important tasks of the aircraft cabin door is to make the
cabin door open and close according to the preset trajectory. If the design is unreasonable, during the actual opening
and closing action, the cabin door may repeatedly rub or cause a large impact with the aircraft fuselage, requiring
excessive power in unnecessary places [4].

With the popularization of materials science, control theory, precision manufacturing and motor technology, high-
power and fast-response power actuation technologies are becoming more mature, and high-voltage DC or variable-
frequency power generation systems on aircraft will eventually replace constant-frequency power systems. The
dynamic system will replace the current centralized hydraulic system to power the aircraft's operating system, and
the electric actuating cabin door has become the main direction of research around the world.

The power actuation system uses the method of power by wire. Power by wire is accompanied by the design concept
of a multi-electric all-electric aircraft, which mainly uses electric power to replace the aircraft's drive system using
other energy sources.

Power telex actuators can be divided into two forms: EMA(Electromechanical actuator) and EHA( Electro
hydrostatic actuator). Compared with EHA, EMA's performance is extremely obvious, mainly reflected in the
following aspects:

i) EHA uses hydraulic transmission to output force and power. The hydraulic system contains complex
hydraulic lines, which occupy a large volume, and there are a large amount of hydraulic oil in the
hydraulic pipeline. The quality is heavier, and the EMA is compact and the space used is greatly
reduced. The weight is also reduced a lot. In addition, the EMA avoids problems such as flammable
and leaking hydraulic oil in the hydraulic system, and the system reliability is high;
ii) Because the EHA contains different components of mechanical, hydraulic transmission, electrical and
other disciplines, it is difficult to locate the fault location when the fault occurs, and the maintenance is
difficult. In the EMA system, the parameters of the actuation system are convenient and intuitive to
detect. Good maintainability;
iii) EMA can greatly reduce the required fuel consumption, reduce the take-off weight, and consume less
energy to complete the same operation as EHA, so EMA is more efficient [5].

Researchers in the United States have developed a third-generation electric brake system in the form of a
combination of a permanent-magnet DC brushless motor and a pulley screw in the development of a test-flying
electric brake system. The entire electromechanical actuator consists of four permanent magnet brushless DC motors,
each of which drives the ball four cylinders to compress the brakes. The performance of the brushless DC motor and
low inertia components, the response frequency of the entire electromechanical sitting is 20-30Hz, and the response
frequency of the hydraulic actuator is about 10Hz. The total weight of the entire servo drive is reduced by the
elimination of hydraulic lines and equipment. In France, Messi Gabidi has also achieved certain technical results on
the all-electric brake system. The power by wire drive device currently developed can be used as the main means of
maneuvering the aircraft's key flight rudder surface. Most of the power electric actuators that have been developed
and tested have permanent magnet synchronous motors [6].

The electric actuated cabin door control system requires the cabin door rotation mechanism to quickly start, stop,
accelerate and decelerate, for which the brushless DC motor with high performance, high reliability and large
power-to-volume ratio should be selected as the driving device of the cabin door drive control system.

In order to improve the reliability of the operation of the cabin door and reduce the peak power of the motor-driven
door operation, this paper uses MATLAB/Simulink to simulate the working process of the motor-driven door
operation. The basic idea is to use different specified position curves for the control system and compare the results.

1.2 Research objective

 In order to overcome the issues of low efficiency, large installed power of engine and leakage problem of
hydraulic system, this thesis proposed a new cabin door moving system. The main idea is to use an
electromechanical actuator with BLDC motor and gear speed reducer for increasing the torque and reducing the
speed to perform the smooth cabin door opening and closing operation. The proposed system pose enhanced
reliability and reduce the peak power consumption of motor-driven cabin door operation. The compact size of pure
electro-mechanical actuator, i.e. BLDC motor will address the spacing issue. The new system is expected to have
small installed power which will lighten up the overall burden on the aircraft engine.

1.3 Significance of the research

If successful, the study will effectively improve the overall performance of the commercial aircrafts cabin door
operation that are currently using traditional hydraulic and hybrid (Hydraulic and electro-mechanical) systems. This
study is expected to be particularly useful for advanced research; especially, for the modern passenger carrier
aircrafts. In addition, this system will solve the leakage, maintenance and complexity problems which are associated
with hydraulic system.
1.4 Dissertation organization
This dissertation presents a novel system design for commercial aircraft cabin door opening and closing operation.
The use of BLDC motor with gear speed reducer is the vital subject of this thesis dissertation. This system avoids
the use of complex hydraulic system and proposes a simple but efficient way of replacing it. This dissertation
contains six chapters describing the design of commercial aircraft cabin door: Brush-less DC motor, its
characteristics, dynamic model with integration to gear speed reducer as follows:
Chapter 1 starts with the introduction about commercial aircraft cabin door newly proposed design by using
EMA(electro-mechanical actuator) with BLDC motor and explains the research objective.
Chapter 2 Describes the fundamentals and principle of BLDC motor drives, BLDC motor three loop control, like
position control loop, speed control loop, current control loop. The electromagnetic behavior of the BLDC motor,
and the torque production mechanism in BLDC motors with a little touch of gear speed reducer.
Chapter 3 describes about previously designed aircraft cabin door systems by using traditional hydraulic system,
hydraulic system combine with electro-mechanical actuator methods are studied and recent progresses in this extent
are presented with their inborn benefits and disadvantages. Expected research exertions and drifts are also discussed.
(Literature review, motivation, objective, why we do this research) presents the novel commercial aircraft cabin
door movement system and discussion about PI position and speed control of BLDC motor. Gear speed reducer etc..
Chapter 4 describes results and discussions for commercial aircraft cabin door based on electro-mechanical
actuator performance, Simulation results on MALTLAB/Simulink are provided to verify the effectiveness of the
proposed strategy.
Chapter 5; (refer to thesis attached, Adeel Ahsan’s thesis) Total hardware composition of commercial aircraft cabin
door movement process design, Experimental study, Design of BLDC drive, Power inverter circuit, Quad channel
Digital Isolater ADUM1401, ADUM1201, 3phase bridge driver IR2136x, MAX488ESA(IC..search datasheet on
the internet), HZD24S05(IC….search datasheet on the internet), Dual operational amplifier LM2904, Hall-Effect
Current Sensor Breakout(ACS712), Hex inverting Schmitt trigger 74LVC14A Experimental system, PCB Design(I
will send the images of PCB), Hardware Experimentation, Overview of the system and software development
process. Gear speed reducer (A mechanical part which is used for Reducing the speed and increasing the torque for
low speed applications of BLDC motor).
NOTE: Above are all the IC’s used in this thesis, please find the relevant data and discuss it. Use Adeel Ahsan’s
thesis for reference. I will send the thesis to you…
Chapter 6 explains about thesis conclusion and future work
References