Real Time Loading Test Rig for Flight Control Actuators Under PHM Experimentation

The article deals with the architecture, performance, and experimental tests of a test bench for servo-actuators used in flight controls. After the state of the art on the subject, the innovative architecture of the built bench is described, in which flight control actuator under test and load actuator are not in line but mounted perpendicularly. The model of the bench actuating systems is then presented, consisting of the servo-controlled hydraulic actuator, load cell, speed transducer, angular position transducer of the coupling and pressure transducers. For each of these components the nonlinear multi-physics mechatronic model is described, according to the adopted solutions. The adopted force control algorithm is discussed, showing the integrative compensation on the action line and proportional-derivative on the feedback, with speed feedforward. The experimental tests carried out on the bench under stalled conditions are also presented, whose results concerning time and frequency responses are compared with those obtained through the linearized and non-linear numerical model. Finally, the non-linear models of the flight control actuator under test, controlled in position, and of the loading servo-actuator of the bench are joined together, and the results of various simulations are described.