Flight Management Leg Entry for Flexible Mid-Flight Replanning
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Solution Overview
Problem
Flight management systems (FMS) in aircraft are limited by the number of leg types they can accommodate, restricting flexibility and adaptability in flight planning, especially during mid-flight modifications, and uplinked flight plans face similar limitations.
Innovation Solution
The FMS is enhanced to accept a plurality of leg types beyond the typical five, using a matrix to determine compatible transitions between legs, allowing for more flexible flight planning and mid-flight modifications, and supports uplinked flight plans with additional leg options.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If the FMS is enhanced to accept a plurality of leg types beyond the typical five, then flexibility and adaptability in flight planning is improved, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The FMS is enhanced to accept multiple leg types (direct-to, track-to, course-to, arc-to, radial-to) beyond the typical five, allowing a single system to perform diverse flight planning functions. This multi-functionality enables the system to handle various flight scenarios and mid-flight modifications without requiring separate specialized systems.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent segments the flight plan into multiple compatible leg types, where each leg type represents a distinct navigational segment. By dividing the overall flight path into compatible segments (direct-to leg, track-to leg, course-to leg, arc-to leg, radial-to leg), the system can manage complexity through structured segmentation while maintaining overall system flexibility.
2Adaptability or versatility
If the FMS accepts more leg types and performs advanced trajectory calculations, then adaptability to unexpected events is improved, but computation time and processing requirements increase
Solution Approach 1:
The FMS determines lateral and vertical trajectories in advance based on the sequence of compatible legs before finalizing the flight plan. By performing these calculations preliminarily during the planning phase rather than in real-time during execution, the system prepares adaptive capabilities ahead of time, reducing computation time when unexpected events require rapid response.
3Manufacturing precision
If the system performs compatibility checks for each leg type transition, then navigation accuracy is improved, but ease of operation decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The FMS automatically performs compatibility checks between consecutive legs in the sequence without requiring manual verification by the pilot. The system self-validates whether each leg type transition is compatible (e.g., ensuring arc-to legs are followed by radial-to or direct-to legs), thereby maintaining high navigation accuracy while preserving ease of operation through automation.
Data Source
AI summary
The present disclosure relates to an FMS configured to accept a plurality of flight legs (beyond the standard five) for consideration when developing a flight plan. Allowing an FMS to receive a plurality of flight legs, beyond just five, is achieved by calculating a lateral trajectory and a vertical trajectory based on the current state of the flight path. This may be done mid-flight or initially when a given flight plan is entered by the pilot. The sequence of leg types that are entered may be used to generate a predicted final trajectory and output a GUI (graphical user interface) of the predicted final trajectory.