Failure aircraft components

It is a well-known fact that failure of an aircraft component can have catastrophic consequences such as loss of precious life and aircraft. It is obvious from Table 7.3 that failures due to fatigue are predominant in aircraft components. When the component is no longer able to withstand the imposed stress, failure will occur. Thus failures are associated with stress concentrations which can occur due to ... 

Some Common Failure Modes in Aircraft Structures Failure of an aircraft component can have catastrophic consequences such as loss of precious life and aircraft. Failure modes in aircraft are given in Table 5.7. 

In 1985, twin-engine airliners were allowed to fly transatlantic routes because jet engine reliability was determined to be so high that failures of other critical aircraft components were far more likely. 

Appendix III contains failure rate estimates for various genetic types of mechanical and electrical equipment. Included ate listings of failure rates with range estimates for specified component failure modes, demand probabilities, and times to maintain repair. It also contains some discussion on such special topics as human errors, aircraft crash probabilities, loss of electric power, and pipe breaks. Appendix III contains a great deal of general information of use to analysts on the methodology of data assessment for PRA. 

The Failure Mode and Effect Analysis (FMEA) is based on the systematic analysis of failure modes for each element of a system, by defining the failure mode and the consequences of this failure on the integrity of that system. It was first used in the 1960s in the field of aeronautics for the analysis of the safety of aircraft [15]. It is required by regulations in the USA and France for aircraft safety. It allows assessing the effects of each failure mode of a system s components and identifying the failure modes that may have a critical impact on the operability safety and maintenance of the system. It proceeds in four steps ... 

Adhesives are used in the electrical and electronic industries in a variety of different ways, from holding microcomponents in place on a circuit board to bonding coils in large power transformers. Reliability is always a concern, since bond failure could lead to component failure, which in turn leads to equipment failure and then possibly to a massive system failure. A system in this industry could be a commercial aircraft s electrical system or the power distribution system in an urban city. 

Losses result from component failures, disturbances external to the system, interactions among system components, and behavior of individual system components that lead to hazardous system states. Examples of hazards include the release of toxic chemicals from an oil refinery, a patient receiving a lethal dose of medicine, two aircraft violating minimum separation requirements, and commuter train doors opening between stations. ... 

Chapters on coordination provides a description of the spare parts inventory supply chain at the US Coast Guard (USCG) [27]. We summarize the specific features of the spare parts system and the changes made to improve performance. The main supply chain support for air assets for the Coast Guard is the Aircraft Repair and Supply Center (ARSC) located in Elizabeth City, NC. Aircraft failures in the airstations are often tracked to part failures. Those parts are replaced with working parts from field inventory at the air station and the salvageable broken components are shipped to ARSC for repair. In turn, ARSC replenishes field inventory. 

Note The Criticality is assigned to the severity at Level 3, and this requires detailed knowledge of the Level 3 architecture (e.g. redundancy) and Level 4 application (e.g. is the aircraft cleared for low-level IFR). A piece-part FMEA is useful for systems that rely on redundancy (since a functional FMEA may not reveal single component failures affecting more than one redundant element) and is particularly useful for assessing electronic components, mechanical elements and assemblies (refer ARP4176 para G.3.2). 

As this case study is required to support a CS25.1309 safety assessment, it is suggested that a Functional FMEA at the system integration level (i.e. Level 3 in Fig. 1.1) would be more appropriate than a piece-part FMEA at the component level. ° This Functional FMEA will have the objective of searching for single failure conditions in the Barometric Altitude Display System which might cause a catastrophic failure at the aircraft level (i.e. Level 4 in Fig. 1.1). 

In Table 5.10 we identify the effect of the failure on the component (in column 7), then the effect on the Barometric Altitude Display System (column 8), and finally the effect at the aircraft level (column 9). Note in column 9 that we have elected to use the severity descriptor from Table 3.3 as it facilitates severity allocation in column 10. 

ID Component in zone External failure mode(s) Intrinsic hazards Systemic vulnerabilities Effect on the aircraft Corrective/preventative action and/or mitigations... 

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