Use Reliability Analysis Of The General Aviation Aeroplane Landing Gear System

With the development of the society and the improvement of the aerospace technology, striving to develop the general aviation becomes the inevitable trend of the global aeronautic industry nowadays. The safety and economic efficiency of general aviation aeroplanes are very important for the general aviation operators, and the related general aviation industries also develop rapidly. The landing gear system is a very important system of airplane. It affects safety of taking off, landing and ground maneuver of the plane. The failures of landing gear system can be reduced by improving the use reliability of the system, which can meet the airplane airworthy requirements, ensure the safety and efficient usage of airplanes, cut off the cost and enhance the economic efficiency.Based on the use information and failure data which are recorded by the users and maintenance departments of general aviation airplanes, the lifetime distribution is evaluated and determined by the testing of hypotheses. Reliability indices are calculated by the relative computational methods using the result of the lifetime distribution. The characteristics, reasons, failure modes, effects and criticalities of the frequent failures of the landing gear system are analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively by the theoretics of fault tree analysis and failure mode effect and criticality analysis. The flight, maintenance and environmental factors which affect the use reliability of the landing gear system are also analyzed. Based on the analysis of this article, corresponding suggestions and counter-measures about the design and manufacture, especially in the use and maintenance aspects are given.