Lifting and Life Extension of Fracture Critical Aeroengine Components

摘要

Engine removal costs and the consequences of grounding aircraft are many times greater than the replacement component costs. The paper addresses several areas where DERA has been instrumental in generating procedures to enable more of the available safe service lives of fracture critical aeroengine components to be utilized. More effective methods for handling non-finite results (discontinued fatigue tests) are explored. General life extension via support of the 2/3 dysfunction' is considered and also the associated procedures necessary for cashing in' any available safe crack growth life beyond life-to- first-crack. The paper addresses the development of robust risk management procedures for situations where operational requirements demand the short-term continued use of life expired parts. Finally, some results of short crack growth modelling aimed at enhanced lifting methods are presented.