Composite material wing structure

Details Composite material wing structure Composite material wing structure

1999-06-23

2001-05-29

Eldred, J. Woodrow (Department: 3644)

Aeronautics and astronautics

Aircraft structure

Airfoil construction

C244S124000, C244S03500A, C416S22300B

Reexamination Certificate

active

06237873

ABSTRACT:

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a composite material wing structure which is applied to, for example, the main wing of an airplane.
2. Description of the Related Art
There are many types of wing structures for airplanes as prior arts as shown in
FIGS. 10
to
12
are known. The first example for the structure shown in
FIG. 10
is the conventional wing structure made of such various parts as an upper skin
100
, an lower skin
101
, a front spar
102
, a rear spar
103
, and a plurality of ribs
104
. And these members are permanently connected by various kinds of fasteners. Accordingly, this kind of the wing structure of the airplane has so many components that the assembly becomes very difficult for precisely mating each other because each has an allowable tolerance for manufacturing.
The second example shown in
FIG. 11
is a little improved wing structure
115
. According to the second type of the structure, first, a box spar is assembled with a front spar
112
, a rear spar
113
, and ribs
114
. And next, the box spar is put on a lower skin
111
, then forming a lower structure
115
. Finally, an entire wing structure is made by covering the lower structure
115
with an upper skin
116
. As a matter of fact, the lower structure
115
is integrally formed, however, it is still a simple concept of an integration of only the front and rear spars and the lower skin. The assembly still requires many jigs.
The third example of the conventional wing structure shown in
FIG. 12
is a cross-sectional view where spars
118
are integrally formed on a lower skin
117
, and then covered by an upper skin
119
thereon. After that, assembled are a leading edge
120
on the front side, and a trailing edge
121
on the rear side.
According to these conventional assembling methods, there are many drawbacks. That is, It means that the structure requires many assembling jigs not only for making each but also for sub-assembling and/or final assembly of all of them. It causes to become heavier and costlier.
Even though the spars and the ribs are integrally formed in the lower skin as shown in the third example, molding processes with many assembly jigs becomes very complicated and costlier due to many laborious works for laminating many layers of prepregs. Anyway, as either one of the skins must be fastened in the last process, the total cost of making this kind of wing structures becomes high.
It has been well known that a multi-spur integral molding system is less costlier for making the wing structure than the conventional ones shown in
FIGS. 10
to
12
, however, it is very difficult to make one integral wing structure because some components must receive a heavy load. For example, it is impossible to use such an integral structure for a structural member for bearing the heavy load applied from an aileron, a flap, a spoiler or a landing gear due to lacking the strength thereof.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
An object of the present invention is to provide a composite material wing structure which can overcome the foregoing problems and enables realization of light weight and low cost.
According to the composite material wing structure of the present invention, the manufacture thereof becomes easy by dividing a long wing into several portions. This is attained by dividing a long multi-spar structure made from the composite materials into a plurality of small units of the multi-spar structure. Therefore, each unit of the multi-spar structure is lined up in the span-wise direction.
As both of the multi-spar structure and the skin have each allowable manufacturing tolerance, it is very difficult to precisely assemble all of them by the fasteners. It requires very troublesome fastening works for adjustments to mate each other for making the conventional wing structure. And worse, the structure must be assembled by mating the multi-spar structure with the skin.
For avoiding the above mentioned troublesome works, the present invention can provide a simple manufacturing process without connecting the upper skin thereto. The wing structure of the present invention has a plurality of the spans extending in a span-wise direction, and each of multi spar structures is divided in several groups of cells in the span-wise direction, so that a long wing can be manufactured in a unit.
In the composite material of the present invention, the composite material multi-spar structure is such that a plurality of spars are integrally molded between an upper surface skin and an lower surface skin, so that there is no allowable tolerance of parts or no fastening operation of the upper surface skin, and the manufacturing process becomes simple.
In the composite material wing structure of the present invention, a rib is attached to at least one end of the composite material multi-spar structure in an orthogonal direction to the spar. And, the composite material multi-spar structures are connected to the rib by fastening devices. So that the rib is interposed between the composite material multi-spar structures, whereby the structure can be applied to the main wing of a passenger airplane to which a large load such as a load applied from a flap or a landing gear. Therefore, it enables realization of light weight and low cost.
In the composite material wing structure of the present invention, a vent line extending in the span-wise direction can be formed in the spar itself of the composite material multi-spar structure.


REFERENCES:
patent: 5501414 (1996-03-01), Bauer
patent: 5735486 (1998-04-01), Piening et al.
patent: 5848765 (1998-12-01), Gillespie
patent: 303360 (1929-11-01), None

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