Aircraft Selector Lever With Independent Detent Pin Slides
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional aircraft selector levers lack an effective mechanism to detect the failure of detent pins, which can lead to increased maintenance costs and reduced safety.
Innovation Solution
A selector lever design featuring a shaft with movable slides connected to detent pins, allowing for individual testing of pin integrity without disassembly, by moving the slides to engaged or disengaged positions to determine the ability to rotate the shaft, indicating pin status.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional selector lever design is used with detent pins, then the selector lever can control aircraft equipment configuration, but the failure of detent pins cannot be detected
Solution Approach 1:
The selector lever is divided into independent functional modules: the shaft, multiple detent pins, and corresponding slides. Each slide is independently operable and associated with a specific detent pin, allowing individual testing of each pin's integrity without affecting other components. This segmentation enables failure detection of specific detent pins while maintaining the overall structural simplicity.
Solution Approach 2:
The slides are designed to be manually movable by the operator to test detent pin integrity. Each slide can be independently moved to engage or disengage from its corresponding detent pin, allowing the system to self-diagnose pin failure through simple manual operation without requiring external testing equipment or complex diagnostic systems.
2Reliability
If redundancy with multiple detent pins is implemented, then the selector lever remains functional after one pin fails, but maintenance costs increase due to inability to detect failures
Solution Approach 1:
The slides provide immediate feedback on the integrity of each detent pin through their ability to move. When a detent pin fails, the corresponding slide will not engage properly or will be difficult to move, providing clear feedback to the operator about which specific pin has failed. This feedback mechanism enables targeted maintenance of only the failed component rather than replacing entire assemblies.
Solution Approach 2:
The ability to test detent pin integrity through slide movement allows for preliminary detection of pin failure before it affects operational reliability. By regularly testing each pin's integrity through simple slide manipulation, failures can be detected and addressed proactively, preventing potential safety issues and avoiding costly emergency repairs or aircraft groundings.
3Ease of repair
If individual testing of detent pins is enabled, then maintenance can be optimized, but the device structure becomes more complex
Solution Approach 1:
The testing function is merged with the operational components themselves. The slides serve dual purposes: they are integral parts of the selector lever mechanism for normal operation, and simultaneously serve as testing instruments for detecting detent pin integrity. This merging eliminates the need for separate testing mechanisms or disassembly procedures, achieving maintenance optimization without significant structural complexity increase.
Data Source
AI summary
A selector lever with redundant detent pins and detent plates and a method for using the selector lever to test for a failure of one or more detent pins. The selector lever includes at least two slides for independently moving the detent pins within the detent plates. The independent slides allow one detent pin to remain engaged. With only one detent pin engaged, the operator may test the ability to move the shaft and conclude whether or not the detent pin has failed.