Main Rotor Blade inspection

[Hilton Roberts]

There is the possibility that in Mesa, we will be verifying contour of new design Apache main rotor blades. These blades are around 22 feet long and we would need to be able to reach both ends of the blade to make measurements. Anyone out there who has done this have any input on machine selection,fixturing or software to do this kind of inspection?

I am just sort of pre-planning for this so I am not blind sided one Monday Moaning......

Hilton

[ufo_pilot]

Even though we can drive a full size truck under our CMM, we came accross a similar problem once.
We needed to measure stuff on a truck bed, then turn the thing upside down and in the same alignment, (which we were now unable to do) pick up holes under the bedfloor.
So our solution:
In the original alignment (ABC) we measured "hard" features ( molded in features ) in all 3 axis that we could reach when we eventually turned the thing upside-down.
Then we used our MEASURED values from these features to align to the underside as NOMINALS (the deviation is where these points were to ABC, so that's where they stayed) for the new alignment , (Variable substitution) and continued measuring the part.

[Brian Gudauskas]

Hi Hilton, how you been?

1. Long machine. We have done this for another Heli manufacturer, I think an 8 or 10 meter Global would work.

2. Leica laser tracker. This is a manual solution, but could be made to work if checking is not needed often.


Email me if you need to discuss more...

[Bill **********]

WTF is that ^ up there?

Hilton,

We just had a discussion in regards to this type of situation in another thread talking about EQUATE ALIGNMENTS. I don't do rotors so I'm only tossing out an idea, but it may be worth your time to take a look at that thread. Also, isn't blade runner specifically for doing air foils?

Here's the thread I mentioned: http://www.pcdmisforum.com/showthrea...ghlight=equate

Bill