Reducing airlines part deflection

Citation

(2001), "Reducing airlines part deflection", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 73 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/aeat.2001.12773aab.011

Reducing airlines part deflection

Reducing airlines part deflection

Keywords: Airbus, Jammes Industrie

Airbus Industrie in Blagnac, France, designed its A340-600 commercial airliners, the latest members of its A330/A340 family, with a stretched fuselage, an enlarged and refined wing, and a revised undercarriage. Airbus claims these innovations will reduce operating costs of the aircraft, making it more competitive in the long-range, wide-body market. Similarly, Jammes Industrie of Cebazat, France, built an innovation into its a-191-NC metal rolling machine to prevent deflection of the aluminium alloy segments that will be used to make the central portion of the A340-600's fuselage.

An automated system feeds aluminium sheets 60 to 40 feet long and 0.03 to 0.05 inch thick into the A-191-NC so that its three adjustable rollers can exert 300 metric tonnes of pressure to bend them into shape. The computer numerically controlled machine can store up to 100 programs to roll complex shapes for aeroplane fuselages, wing leading edges, and tail cones.

Jammes Industrie developed a new system to eliminate the roll deflection caused by the powerful force exerted by the rollers. This system consists of several motorised sloping blocks to compensate for the bending and maintain the roller parallel arrangement along the entire length of the machine.