Technical Analysis of Optimization of Management Process of Aircraft Body Fasteners

The aircraft structure is highly efficient, and the joints of the accessories must distribute the load as much as possible. Therefore, the installation of the fasteners must be over-fit to ensure that the load of one fastener is not higher than the other at the joint. This requires specialized manufacturing methods. There are many relevant guidelines for fastener joint design, some of which are uniquely designed for the body. Including the distance from the edge, the fastener pitch and the acceptable grip length range. Finally, the design must also define special finishing operations and variables for the fastener hole assembly state in order to achieve higher manufacturing efficiency.

Thousands of difficult-to-manage fastener data are generated from the body design to the manufacturing process. These data and information must be delivered accurately and completely entered into the assembly sequence of the relevant manufacturing system. The task of defining and expressing this information is arduous and complex. The development team must exchange design information with manufacturing engineers so that they can plan the continuous assembly state and effectively manage production with a large amount of fasteners and related information. This is a big challenge for traditional aviation structure, but for composite aerospace structures, it is more difficult due to the interaction between composite material design and accessories, and the brittleness of composite materials requires precision during drilling. Control speed and feed to avoid possible delamination and other defects, while ensuring high productivity.

VistagysSyncroFIT is a solution used by body manufacturers to meet this challenge. It solves the problem of complexity of body development by simplifying the definition process (to ensure that a complete definition is generated) and smoothly transferring fastener data to the manufacturing system.

The amount of information related to this complex design is huge. Providing an effective way to transfer data to the manufacturing system is the main obstacle to economical production. In the past, the only way was manual labor. The clamping length and edge distance were manually detected. The location of the fasteners was also manually arranged, and the resulting work instructions were often wrong. SyncroFIT simplifies the whole process by letting engineers develop an accurate definition of assembly (specially for the development process of the airframe), and then use this definition as the basis of assembly, and pass it to the manufacturing work cell for assembly. This special information related to fasteners and holes is directly transmitted to automation equipment and assembly technicians through automated projection equipment, and the installation steps are displayed through video work instructions.

SyncroFIT can easily define fastener specifications and layouts. It can also check the ability of machine tools to install fasteners and the status of fasteners to ensure that the design criteria are met. When the design is released to manufacturing, the system seamlessly transmits the specifications and locations of the holes and fasteners to the automatic drilling and fastener installation system.