Design of an electrical distribution test rig for validation of equipment for more electrical aircraft

Abstract

In order to mitigate economical, ecological and technological challenges aircraft manufacturers have shifted towards more electrical aircraft, bringing with it many new technologies to be implemented and a redesign of the existing electrical network. This paper details the development of an electrical distribution centre as taking place under the European Framework 7 Clean Sky Program. The developed distribution centre is to be integrated into an existing electrical test bench which recreates the entire electrical system of an aircraft and allows both aircraft and aerospace equipment manufactures to conduct verification activities over different aircraft electrical architectures. The task then of the distribution centre is to bring an element of flexibility to the existing electrical test bench in order for it to be easily reconfigured into any aircraft architecture, including both airplane and rotorcraft. In order to achieve this, the distribution centre contains both low voltage and high voltage DC bus bars. The connection of sources and loads to the bus bars, and the interconnection between bus bars themselves, are achieved by using Racks, each of which contains a controllable and sequenceable switching element together with high fidelity proprietary measurement instrumentation and embedded protection. The entire system has undergone in-house testing and successfully passed factory acceptance tests before its delivery and subsequent commissioning, with the results being noted and discussed here.