An Impact Monitoring System for Aeronautical Structures

Direct or indirect effects provoked by foreign object impacts on aeronautical structures, represent a major concern for military and civil aviation. The problem potentially intensifies with the adoption of composite materials, especially if Barely Visible Impact Damages (BVID) are generated in the structure. The knowledge of whether an impact event has happened and if it has produced a damage, is highly desirable allowing maintenance improvements and the management of risky situations. This can be achieved developing an Impact Monitoring (IM) system, eventually integrable with other monitoring systems for the implementation of a Predictive Maintenance (PM) philosophy. This work deals with the problem of the development of the conceptual scheme of an Impact Monitoring system; it can be considered composed of two parts: (i) a passive impact monitoring part and (ii) an active damage monitoring part. The former part is dedicated to the diagnosis of Low Velocity Impact (LVI) events, meaning the detection, localization and reconstruction of the force exerted on the structure by the foreign object. The latter part is dedicated to the diagnosis of an impact damage, meaning the detection of the damage presence and its qualitative estimation. The IM system is then applied to LVIs on composite structures, typical of aeronautical applications.