Aircraft Maintenance Coordination Control Unit

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Solution Overview

Problem

Manual scheduling and rescheduling of aircraft maintenance operations are time-consuming and labor-intensive, often disrupting flight schedules and affecting multiple aircraft, due to the lack of automated systems for coordinating maintenance and revising flight schedules efficiently.

Innovation Solution

A system comprising a maintenance coordination control unit that receives health signals from aircraft health management subsystems, schedules maintenance operations, and revises tail assignments to accommodate these operations, utilizing databases for maintenance issues and tail assignments, and can be an AI or machine learning system to automate the process.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Reliability

If manual scheduling and rescheduling of aircraft maintenance operations is performed, then maintenance issues can be addressed, but the process becomes time-consuming and labor-intensive

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvemaintenance operation coordinationVSAvoidscheduling time
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

The system enables automated self-scheduling of maintenance operations by having the control unit automatically receive health signals, determine maintenance needs, schedule maintenance operations, and revise flight schedules without human intervention, allowing the system to serve itself in the scheduling process

Inventive Principle:
Principle #25Self-service

Solution Approach 2:

The patent replaces the manual mechanical scheduling process with an automated electronic control system that uses health management data to automatically determine and schedule maintenance operations, substituting human labor with an electronic control mechanism

Inventive Principle:
Principle #28Mechanics substitution (Replace mechanical system)

2Reliability

If manual rescheduling of aircraft schedules is performed to accommodate maintenance operations, then maintenance can be scheduled, but the process affects numerous other aircraft and becomes overwhelming

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvemaintenance operation coordinationVSAvoidschedule coordination complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The control unit performs multiple functions including receiving health signals, determining maintenance needs, scheduling maintenance operations, and revising flight schedules within a single integrated system, allowing one component to handle diverse scheduling tasks across multiple aircraft

Inventive Principle:
Principle #6Universality (Multi-functionality)

Solution Approach 2:

The system continuously receives health signals from aircraft and uses this feedback to automatically adjust and revise flight schedules, creating a closed-loop control system that adapts to changing maintenance needs while coordinating with the overall flight schedule

Inventive Principle:
Principle #23Feedback

3Productivity

If automated systems are implemented for coordinating maintenance and revising flight schedules, then scheduling efficiency is improved, but system complexity increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvescheduling efficiencyVSAvoidautomation system complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
ProductivityVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The patent combines health management functions, maintenance scheduling functions, and flight schedule revision functions into a single integrated control unit, merging multiple separate systems into one unified automated system that manages the entire maintenance coordination process

Inventive Principle:
Principle #5Merging (Combining)

Data Source

PatentEP4371889A1Systems and methods for coordinating maintenance operations for aircraft
Publication Date: 2024.05.22 THE BOEING CO
  • EP4371889A1 patent drawingFigure 1
  • EP4371889A1 patent drawingFigure 2
  • EP4371889A1 patent drawingFigure 3~4

AI summary

A system and a method include a maintenance coordination control unit configured to receive one or more health signals from one or more health management sub-systems of one or more aircraft. The one or more health signals include one or more tail assignments and one or more maintenance issues for the one or more aircraft. The maintenance coordination control unit is further configured to schedule one or more maintenance operations for the one or more aircraft. The one or more maintenance operations are configured to remedy the one or more maintenance issues.