Aircraft Onboard Maintenance Data Correlation

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Solution Overview

Problem

Current centralized maintenance systems for aircraft fail to accurately identify and diagnose equipment failures due to lack of consideration for operational context and configuration parameters, leading to false failure reports and potential masking of critical issues.

Innovation Solution

A centralized maintenance device on board aircraft that correlates failure indicators, alerts, operational context, and configuration data, including pilot markers and logbook entries, using a man-machine interface to prioritize and display data for efficient diagnosis.

Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles

VSEngineering Contradiction Analysis

1Measurement precision

If traditional centralized maintenance systems only collect failure indicators and alerts without considering operational context and configuration parameters, then the system complexity remains low, but the measurement precision of failure diagnosis deteriorates leading to false failure reports

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvefailure diagnosis accuracyVSAvoiddata correlation system complexity
Core Design Contradiction:
Measurement precisionVSDevice complexity

Solution Approach 1:

The maintenance data is segmented into distinct categories including failure indicators, alerts, operational context parameters, configuration parameters, event markers, and logbook entries. Each segment is processed and correlated separately through the database system, allowing comprehensive analysis while maintaining manageable data organization and processing complexity.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #1Segmentation

2Reliability

If comprehensive data correlation including operational context and configuration parameters is implemented, then the reliability of failure identification improves, but the loss of time for data processing increases

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvefailure identification reliabilityVSAvoiddata processing time
Core Design Contradiction:
ReliabilityVSLoss of time

Solution Approach 1:

Operational context parameters and configuration parameters are collected and stored in the database in advance during normal aircraft operation, before failures occur. This preliminary data gathering eliminates the need for time-consuming data collection during actual maintenance operations, as all necessary contextual information is already available for immediate correlation with failure indicators.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #10Preliminary action

Solution Approach 2:

The system continuously correlates failure indicators with stored operational context and configuration data, providing real-time feedback on potential failures. The man-machine interface presents prioritized diagnostic information that feeds back to maintenance personnel, enabling rapid decision-making without requiring extensive manual analysis of raw data.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #23Feedback

3Loss of information

If comprehensive maintenance data is collected and correlated without prioritization, then the completeness of diagnostic information improves, but the ease of operation for maintenance personnel deteriorates due to information overload

Engineering Contradiction:
Improvediagnostic information completenessVSAvoidmaintenance interface usability
Core Design Contradiction:
Loss of informationVSEase of operation

Solution Approach 1:

The man-machine interface applies local quality by presenting different levels of information detail in different interface areas. Critical prioritized diagnostic information is prominently displayed for immediate action, while comprehensive correlated data is available in structured formats for detailed analysis when needed. This allows maintenance personnel to access complete information without being overwhelmed by it during routine operations.

Inventive Principle:
Principle #3Local quality

Data Source

PatentEP2656221B1Centralised maintenance arrangement for aircrafts
Publication Date: 2018.01.24 THALES SA
  • EP2656221B1 patent drawingFigure 1
  • EP2656221B1 patent drawingFigure 2
  • EP2656221B1 patent drawingFigure 3

AI summary

The present invention relates to a centralized maintenance device embedded on board an aircraft carrying out in particular the following functions: correlation of data regarding faults, alerts, configurations, operational contexts, markers, journal log, received by the onboard maintenance system (20); storage of the data received by the onboard maintenance system (20) in a first database (27); management of a historical log of the data received and of their correlation; transmission to a man-machine interface of the data received, of their correlation, of a date associated with each data item; display by a man-machine interface of the onboard maintenance system (20) of the data received, of their correlation and of the date associated with each data item.