Aviation Manufacturing Industry Research Articles

The Impact of Emerging Technologies in the Aviation Manufacturing Industry: A Case Study of the Gradual-Change Factors in Shaanxi, PR China

As China’s economy becomes more robust, the government has emphasized the need to increase the civil aviation industry’s rapid development and reduce civil aviation’s technological gap compared to other advanced aircraft manufacturers. The use of the appropriate technologies in the aviation industry can help achieve the government’s plan of creating more jobs and increasing its revenue through the civil aviation industry. However, emerging technologies’ uncertainty and dynamic nature have led to significant challenges when these technologies are applied to the aviation manufacturing industry. This article applies the principles and methods of system dynamics based on the gradual-change factors of emerging technologies as identified through expert interviews to construct conceptual models depicting the gradual-change of emerging technologies in the aviation manufacturing field. Historical data from Shaanxi province were used to simulate and analyze the gradual development of emerging technologies. An analysis of the simulation results revealed that the rapid growth of competitive technologies in the growth process inhibits the gradual-change of emerging technologies. Also, increasing enterprise innovation capabilities, market demand expansion, and technology optimization significantly promote emerging technologies’ development and application. Furthermore, the research result shows that competitive products and technologies influence the gradual development of emerging technologies. Finally, the results indicate that the civil aviation industry should optimize the performance and function of emerging technologies during the early development stage instead of at the market application stage.

AVIC Electronics Shares Exchange to Merge & Acquisition AVIC Electromechanical

Under the impact of China's and world economic conditions and development under the novel coronavirus pneumonia epidemic as the background, it is necessary to further extend its impact on the economic situation and development of the aviation industry, to introduce this articles research motif, that is, the development of aviation manufacturing industry after enterprise restructuring under the background of the novel coronavirus epidemic. This paper takes the share swap and merger of AVIC Electromechanical as a case study to conduct financial data analysis, market data analysis and performance analysis respectively, so as to compare the situation of AVIC Electronics before and after the restructuring. Subsequently, this paper will analyze the advantages and disadvantages brought by the restructuring to the enterprise. Then, one needs to put forward the suggestions for the future development of AVIC Electronics in the field of military aviation, civil aviation, and industrial manufacturing, and finally give a conclusion, pointing out the significance of this article and the areas that still need to be improved.

Exploration and practice of aviation manufacturing talent training mode based on “practical ability-oriented and industry-education integration”

The aviation manufacturing industry is a key area for innovation-driven development. In order to adapt to the new requirements for aviation manufacturing talents put forward by the transformation and upgrading of the aviation industry, Nanchang Hangkong University and AVIC Hongdu Group continue to explore and practice the talent training channels urgently needed for tooling design positions. The university and enterprise jointly built an aviation manufacturing talent training model based on “practical ability-oriented and industry-education integration.” The effective method formed from four aspects: the determination of talent training methods, the establishment of professional curriculum system, the innovation of teaching methods and the improvement of university-enterprise collaborative management mechanism. Thus, the win-win cooperation between the university and enterprise has been realized, and valuable experience has been accumulated for exploring a new aviation manufacturing talent training model.

Green and Low-Carbon Development of Aviation Manufacturing Industry

Green and Low-Carbon Development of Aviation Manufacturing Industry

The development of digital thread: the relations to digital twin and its industrial applications

PurposeThrough this research study, the authors found that digital thread has made significant progress in the life cycle management of the US Air Force. The authors hope that by reviewing similar studies in the aerospace field, the meaning of digital thread can be summarized and applied to a wider range of fields. In addition, theoretically, the definition of digital twin and digital thread are not unified. The authors hope that the comparison of digital thread and digital twin will better enable scholars to distinguish between the two concepts. Besides, the authors are also looking forward that more people will realize the significance of digital thread and carry out future research.Design/methodology/approachComplete research about digital thread and the relevant concept of the digital twin is conducted. First, by searching in Google Scholar with the keyword “digital thread”, the authors filter results and save literature with high relevance to digital thread. The authors also track these papers’ references for more paper of digital thread and digital twin. After removing the duplicate and low-relevance literature, 72 digital thread-related literature studies are saved and further analyzed from the perspective of time development, application field and research directions.FindingsDigital thread application in industries other than the aviation manufacturing industry is still relatively few, and the research on the application of digital thread in real industrial scenarios is mainly at the stage of framework design and design-side decision optimization. In addition, the digital thread needs a new management mechanism and organizational structure to realize landing. The new management mechanism and the process can adapt to the whole life cycle management process based on the digital thread, manage the data security and data update, and promote the digital thread to play a better effect on the organizational management.Practical implicationsBased on a review of digital thread, future research directions and usage suggestions are given. The fault diagnosis of high-speed train bogie as an example shows the effectiveness of the method and also partially demonstrates the advantages and effects brought by the digital thread connecting the data models at various stages.Originality/valueThis paper first investigates and analyzes the theoretical connotation and research progress of digital thread and gives a complete definition of digital thread from the perspective of the combination of digital thread and digital twins. Next, the research process of digital thread is reviewed, and the application fields, research directions and achievements in recent years are summarized. Finally, taking the fault diagnosis of high-speed train bogie as an example partially demonstrates the advantages and effects brought by the digital thread connecting the data models at various stages.

Surface profile and milling force prediction for milling thin-walled workpiece based on equivalent 3D undeformed chip thickness model

With the development of the aviation manufacturing industry, the application range of thin-walled parts is rapidly increasing. Accurate machining process and surface topography prediction are the keys to ensuring machining quality. This article is based on the relative geometric relationship between the real motion trajectory of the milling cutter and the workpiece; the undeformed chip thickness equation and the two-dimensional surface contour feature algorithm are established. By introducing the parameters of milling cutter critical height, milling cutter helix angle, and lag angle parameters, the three-dimensional surface profile prediction model and the equivalent three-dimensional model considering the chip formation process are derived. And the calculation equations of the instantaneous chip cross-sectional area and the blade-workpiece contact length of the three phases of chip formation are established, respectively. The multiple linear regression method was used to fit the orthogonal test results of titanium alloy Ti-6Al-4 V, so as to complete the dynamic milling force identification, and finally establish the milling force prediction model. The accuracy of the prediction model was verified by the single factor method, and the influence of different parameters on the milling process of thin-walled parts was observed. The results show that the established model has high accuracy in predicting the surface profile and milling force of thin-walled parts. This study provides guidance for efficient prediction of the milling process of thin-walled parts.

Improved design and experimental research of cooperative robot’s manipulator

With the proposal of the Made in China 2025 plan, robots have been widely used in aerospace and other fields. In recent years, robots have been applied in aviation manufacturing industry in the way of man-machine collaboration. Manipulator, as an important part of cooperative robot, plays an important role in its work. In this paper, a new type of modular underactuated manipulator is designed based on the structural improvement of the underactuated manipulator. The test platform of the modular underactuated manipulator is built to verify the actual grasping ability of the manipulator. Experiments show that the design of manipulator is reasonable and can meet the requirements of grasping work.

Effect of assisted transverse magnetic field on distortion behavior of thin-walled components in WEDM process

Machining performance of thin-walled components made by aeronautical difficult-to-process materials is a significant issue in the aviation manufacturing industry. Although wire electric discharge machining-low speed (WEDM-LS) is one of typical non-contact machining processes without macro cutting force, which does well in removing hardness and brittleness materials via pulsed discharge at high temperature, but few researchers have studied the thermal distortion behavior leading to a considerable geometric error in the WEDM-LS of thin-walled components. In this paper, a transverse magnetic field assisted method is applied for affecting the uniformity of discharge point distribution so as to reduce the distortion in WEDM-LS processing thin-wall component. First, the generation mechanism of this new distortion behavior and the impact mechanism of transverse magnetic field (TMF) on distortion are demonstrated by theoretical analysis. In order to further figure out the distortion behavior in the TMF-WEDM process, a new thermo-physical model considering the discharge point distribution is established to simulate temperature field, residual stress field and distortion profiles. Then a large number of Taguchi experiments are carried out to investigate the influences of process parameters including pulse discharge energy (pulse on time, pulse off time, and current) and magnetic field strength on distortion in WEDM-LS. To comparatively analyze simulated and experimental results, the accuracy of established thermo-physical model is verified within a relative error of 18.38 % in distortion. Moreover, it can be revealed that transverse magnetic field contribute to significantly improve the longitudinal distribution uniformity with maximum increase of 12.32% at magnetic field strength: 0.15 T, leading to significant reductions of 32.77% in distortion and 22.68% in recast layer. Eventually, we also presented the variation of residual stress and recast layer along thickness direction under different distortion behavior, which are in good agreement with that of distortion behavior.

Application of a tailored eco-friendly nanofluid in pressurized internal-cooling grinding of Inconel 718

In the precision machining and ultra-precision machining of superalloy, grinding fluids are used for cooling and lubricating to improve machining quality and efficiency, nevertheless conventional grinding fluid is harmful to human health and is neither environmental nor economical. As a novel cooling and lubricating medium, nanofluid exhibits excellent cooling and lubrication properties. In this paper, a tailored eco-friendly Al2O3/soybean oil nanofluid is developed for pressurized internal-cooling grinding of Inconel 718, the thermo-physical and tribological properties of the tailored nanofluid are studied initially, furthermore soybean oil, Al2O3/soybean oil nanofluid and conventional grinding fluid are respectively used in pressurized internal-cooling grinding Inconel 718, finally the grinding temperature and surface integrity under three various grinding fluid conditions are compared and analyzed. It can be revealed that the Al2O3/soybean oil nanofluid could result in both a best surface integrity and a lowest grinding temperature relatively, the EDS analysis presumably demonstrates that the Al2O3 nanoparticles play the role of “bearing effect” and a certain “self-repairing effect”, which improves the machined surface integrity significantly. In general, it indicates that the tailored grinding fluid is effective, non-toxic and economical, additionally the proposed grinding method also shows excellent potential to apply in the aviation manufacturing industry.

Effect of Process Parameters on Formability of a AZ31 Magnesium Alloy Thin-Walled Cylindrical Part Formed by Multistage Warm Single-Point Incremental Forming

Magnesium alloys have many distinguished advantages, therefore, they are more and more popularly used in lightweight design of automotive and aviation manufacturing industry. However, its poor plasticity at room temperature has prevented its further application, especially in magnesium alloy sheets forming process. To expand the application of magnesium alloy sheets, single point incremental forming process for rapid prototype manufacturing and small scale productions of sheet metal was investigated. Combining finite element numerical simulations with physical experiments, the relationships between the maximum thickness differences and different process parameters are explored and the optimal process parameters for forming a certain straight wall cylindrical part of AZ31 magnesium alloy were determined. Based on the analysis of the results, the formability of AZ31 magnesium alloy sheet using warm SPIF is improved with the increases of number of forming stage, forming temperature and tool diameter but reduced with the increase of feed rate and interlayer spacing. The suitable forming temperature for AZ31 magnesium alloy sheet is about 250℃. For forming the deeper straight wall cylindrical parts, at least four forming stages are needed.

Research on the Over-outsourcing in Aviation Manufacturing Industry— Case Analysis based on the Boeing 787

In recent years, outsourcing has become a major trend with more and more companies contracting work out to 3rd parties. The aircraft giant—Boeing company，also regards outsourcing as an important way of its production process. In 2003, under the influence of Toyota production system(TPS),Boeing adopted a new manufacturing model to produce the airplane—Boeing 787 Dreamliner. It outsourced more than 70% of the development and production of its aircraft under a 3-Tier system .However, the excess outsourcing has caused lots of problems such as communication issues, lengthy delays and unexpected increased costs. Starting from the practice of Boeing 787 project's global supply chain strategy, this paper analyzes the reasons as well as problems faced by Boeing for outsourcing such a big project, and draw some lessons on how to strengthen the management from the failure of Boeing 787’s early outsourcing stage.

Research on Key Technologies of the General Module Library of Aeronautical Composites Production Line

System simulation technology has become more and more widely used in aviation manufacturing industry. A general module library for aeronautical composites production line was developed, according to the characteristics of the production line layout and production process, combined with practical engineering experience. Based on it, the simulation analyst can create models for different types of composite material production lines quickly and easily, and can do the layout simulation evaluation, bottleneck research and scheme quantitative comparison and so on. Moreover, a demonstration usage of the module library for a practical case was given.

A manufacturing-oriented error modelling method for a hybrid machine tool based on the 3-PRS parallel spindle head

Five-axis hybrid machine tools are widely used due to the advantages of high speed, high precision, and good performance in the aviation and aerospace manufacturing industry. Many scholars have stu...

Effect of Static Pressure on Friction and Wear Behavior of Aluminum Alloy Surface by Ultrasonic Rolling

Aluminum alloy is one of the most widely light structural materials in the aviation manufacturing industry. The fatigue strength and service life of workpiece can be effectively increased with the improvement of wear resistance. The surface quality of 7050 aluminum alloy under different static pressure (200N-1200N) is obtained by ultrasonic rolling. The effect of static pressure on the friction and wear properties of aluminum alloy surface in ultrasonic rolling process were studied by end surface friction and wear experiment, and the micro-morphology of wear surface was analysed by the super depth microscope. The research showed that the wear resistance of the material surface can be effectively elevated by ultrasonic rolling. Wear degree and wear coefficient of the material were the best, and wear resistance can be improved about 1.5% when static pressure was 600N.

A novel stability prediction approach for thin-walled component milling considering material removing process

The milling stability of thin-walled components is an important issue in the aviation manufacturing industry, which greatly limits the removal rate of a workpiece. However, for a thin-walled workpiece, the dynamic characteristics vary at different positions. In addition, the removed part also has influence on determining the modal parameters of the workpiece. Thus, the milling stability is also time-variant. In this work, in order to investigate the time variation of a workpiece’s dynamic characteristics, a new computational model is firstly derived by dividing the workpiece into a removed part and a remaining part with the Ritz method. Then, an updated frequency response function is obtained by Lagrange’s equation and the corresponding modal parameters are extracted. Finally, multi-mode stability lobes are plotted by the different quadrature method and its accuracy is verified by experiments. The proposed method improves the computational efficiency to predict the time-varying characteristics of a thin-walled workpiece.

Prediction of Dynamic Milling Stability considering Time Variation of Deflection and Dynamic Characteristics in Thin-Walled Component Milling Process

The milling stability of thin-walled component is an important problem in the aviation manufacturing industry. The milling stability is influenced by both deflection characteristic and dynamic characteristic of workpiece. Moreover, in the material removal, the deflection and dynamic characteristics of workpiece are time-variant on the change of machining positions. Thus, the milling stability is also time-variant. In order to investigate the time variation of deflection and dynamic characteristics of workpiece, a new computational model was established in this paper. Based on the influences of the deflection and the dynamic characteristics of workpiece, a new stability lobes diagram which can show different stability domains and chatter domains in different process positions was obtained. Experimental testing has been conducted to validate the established new model.

Making sense of flying: Designers give sense to the aviation manufacturing industry

Abstract This article aims to extend the body of knowledge on Sensemaking as a capability for organizational and strategic change by investigating how design methods could support Sensemaking activities. In order to investigate how design methods can consciously influence Sensemaking activities and how this supports an organization, the case of a large aviation industry manufacturer is taken into consideration. The company under investigation is dealing with implementing their newly established strategy to its everyday work and product innovation practices moving towards service enabling systems. This strategy has been chosen as industry is forced to find new drivers such as passenger experience to gain competitive advantage. As a consequence, manufacturers must also change strategy to support airlines in achieving their goals. Sensemaking is an essential mechanism that manufacturers use to understand the service goals of airlines. Sensemaking is defined as the process of cognitively organizing the unknown in order to give it meaning and to be able to act on it. In three separate moments of the innovation process, each taking place in a different project, design methods were used to explore their ability to support the manufacturer in Sensemaking activities.

Tool life and hole surface integrity studies for hole-making of Ti6Al4V alloy

With a significant growth in the use of titanium alloys in the aviation manufacturing industry, the key challenge of making high-quality holes in the aircraft assembly process needs to be addressed. In this work, case studies deploying traditional drilling and helical milling technologies are carried out to investigate the tool life and hole surface integrity for hole-making of titanium alloy. Results show that the helical milling process leads to much longer tool life, generally lower hole surface roughness, and higher hole subsurface microhardness. In addition, no plastically deformed layer or white layer has been observed in holes produced by helical milling. In contrast, a slightly softened region was always present on the drilled surface. The residual stress distributions within the hole surface, including compressive and tensile residual stress, have also been investigated in detail.

Supply chain risk management in aviation and aerospace manufacturing industry - an empirical study

Supply chain risk management in aviation and aerospace manufacturing industry - an empirical study

An empirical study on measurement of performance through TQM in Pakistani aviation manufacturing industry

Purpose – Pakistani aviation industry is at the initial stage of its evolution and is undergoing transformation to a high-tech developed industry. However, the processes and practices in this industry are quite primitive and lack performance-measuring techniques for decision makers. The available literature in the total quality management (TQM) suggests a set of standardized factors for evaluating the performance of any organization. The purpose of this paper is to conduct a research with a view to judge the applicability of these TQM factors for measuring the performance of any aviation manufacturing organization in Pakistan. Design/methodology/approach – This research is focussed on performance evaluation of aviation manufacturing industry of Pakistan through TQM. Eight well-established dimensions of TQM frequently used by renowned researchers were used for an evaluation of the Pakistani Aviation Manufacturing Industry (PAMI), namely top management support, quality information availability, quality information usage, employee training, employee involvement, product/process design, supplier quality and customer orientation. An additional dimension of factual approach to decision making was also used based on the outcome of the pilot survey. Both qualitative and quantitative survey techniques were used for gathering the data for subsequent empirical analysis. Findings – The authors found that the suggested model of measuring organizational performance in PAMI was in general agreement with the TQM model of renowned researchers and can be useful tool for evaluation of quality profile of PAMI organizations. Research limitations/implications – During qualitative interviews with the top management, it was found that some of the PAM organizations did not have the complete data and information about their customers and markets, as well as company's human resource effectiveness, and supplier's performance. Although some of them had started maintaining it recently, but comprehensive longitudinal data were not available, which is quite useful for taking correct decisions. Practical implications – The outcome of this research is expected to contribute in the shape of a TQM measuring tool for decision makers in order to evaluate the performance of any aviation manufacturing organization of Pakistan. This model is, however, required to be empirically tested for its applicability in other regions as well for its generalization. Originality/value – This paper deals with the cross-sectional analysis study of the manufacturing organizations of the Pakistani aviation industry for application of TQM practices. It is an original work undertaken by the authors of this paper where various models have been studied and most commonly used dimensions have been utilized for testing the Pakistani aviation industry.