Integration of structural health monitoring with scheduled maintenance of aircraft composite structures

Abstract

The current aircraft maintenance philosophy, referred to as scheduled maintenance, follows a preventative strategy in which maintenance tasks are carried out at predetermined intervals or according to prescribed criteria related to safety, operational and economic aspects. Emerging technologies, such as structural health monitoring (SHM), are proposed to reduce long-term maintenance cost and increase aircraft availability. It introduces a timely and automatic diagnostic and prognostic capability which brings substantial changes to the current maintenance philosophy. This study investigates an integrated approach of scheduled maintenance and structural health monitoring by suggesting various logical maintenance procedures. A probabilistic model was established to examine the effects of the structural health monitoring synchronisation with scheduled maintenance and the impact on both safety and economy.