Development of a contactless measurement system for real time monitoring of a proprotors flapping angle – Part one

Abstract

Monitoring the flapping and lagging motions of a proprotor in real-time is important to ensure flight safety of modern tilt rotor aircraft. Within the Clean Sky 2 Joint Undertaking funded project "FLAPsense" (No. 785571) a sensor system is being developed suitable to perform that measurement task contactless and in real-time. The system will be integrated in the proprotor assembly and co-rotate with the rotor hub. It will be based on a highly accurate optical sensing method providing the actual flapping motion of the rotor disc to the avionic system. The paper provides an overview on the measurement task to be performed and briefly presents the chosen approaches for the sensor system. Finally, it delivers an outlook on the next steps to be made in order to flight test the FLAPsense sensor system in the frame of the Next Generation Civil Tilt Rotor Technology Demonstrator.