A knowledge driven approach to aerospace condition monitoring

Aircraft operators are continually striving to reduce both the amount and the cost of aircraft maintenance. Whilst at the same time ensuring that the aircraft safety, reliability and integrity are not compromised. One solution which has seen a lot of attention is known as condition monitoring. The aim of condition monitoring is to develop the ability to detect, diagnose and locate damage, even predicting the remaining useful life of the structure or system. There are difficulties associated with developing aerospace condition monitoring which transcends technical, financial and regulatory. Aerospace legislation requires that any decisions on maintenance, safety and flightworthiness to be auditable and data patterns to relate to known information. The use of data, physical models and knowledge approaches can individually produce reliable health related decisions, but the fusing of these different solutions within an appropriate framework will enhance the intelligence in the decision making process. This paper reviews such a framework and design methodology being used for the development of knowledge based condition monitoring systems for aircraft landing gear actuators.