Wire and cable standards are never proactive, but reactive to industry needs, and as the aviation world moves to high power systems, wire and cable must catch up to ensure the products are available for long reliable service life. Twice a year the SAE wire/cable community comes together to slowly push the standards and industry guidance forward; this year, New Orleans was the setting.
During this three-day meeting, several topics were discussed impacting the next generation of aircraft designs. Here, we cover a couple of these developments.
Read moreHaving well-defined and recognized system boundaries is the best means to ensure an analysis of that system is robust and does not leave any analysis gaps. Without an established limit and assigned responsibilities, arguments will ensue as to who is the responsible party and time/effort will be wasted with duplicated analysis.
Because an aircraft’s wiring touches nearly all of the systems, it can be confusing to understand where the system starts and stops, and this has led to confusion as to the responsible party for the wiring system design and/or maintenance. Some organizations have seen the responsibility fall on the electrical power systems teams, others, avionics. Regardless of who takes up the responsibility, a clear definition of the wiring system’s physical and logical boundaries must be agreed upon. Thankfully, there are several industry documents that can be relied upon.
Read moreThe year of 2018 was yet again another substantial year in commercial air travel. The first quarter of 2018 saw commercial flights carry over 202 million passengers in the US, approximately 8 million more than in the first quarter of 2017. Air travel remains increasingly popular, accessible to the public, and statistically the safest way to travel. This level of safety has been earned through decades of groundbreaking innovation, sometimes undeniably spurred by the desire to avoid repeating past tragedy.
An impactful and memorable incident that caused the industry to reevaluate its processes and procedures was the crash of Swissair Flight 111. Occurring almost two years after the Trans World Airlines Flight 800 (TWA800), the Swissair Flight 111 and TWA800 shared a common issue: wiring system failure.
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