Health management unit and method for monitoring health information and transmitting information from the aircraft

• US 9,652,901 B2
• Filed: 10/24/2013
• Issued: 05/16/2017
• Est. Priority Date: 10/24/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: GE Aviation Systems LLC (GE Aerospace)
• Original Assignee: GE Aviation Systems LLC (GE Aerospace)
• Inventors: Steffler, Joseph Bernard, Buehler, Eric Daniel
• Primary Examiner(s): Ferguson, Keith
• Application Number:
  US15/031,419
• Publication Number:
  US 20160260265A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,300 Days
• Field of Search: 455427, 455500, 455517, 455431, 4555521, 4555531, 4555501, 455129, 455 84, 455140, 4554221, 455403, 4554261, 4554262, 455512, 455509, 455450, 455445, 455 121, 455507, 455508, 370338, 370343, 370310, 370312
• CPC Class Codes: B64D 2045/0085 Devices for aircraft health monitoring, e.g. monitoring flutter or vibration
• CPC Class Codes: B64D 45/00 Aircraft indicators or protectors not otherwise provided for camouflage F41H3/00
• CPC Class Codes: G07C 5/008 communicating information to a remotely located station transmission systems for measured values G08C
• CPC Class Codes: G08C 25/00 Arrangements for preventing or correcting errors; Monitoring arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: G08G 5/0013 with a ground station
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/02 Diversity systems; Multi-antenna system, i.e. transmission or reception using multiple antennas RAKE receivers H04B1/7115
• CPC Class Codes: H04B 7/18506 Communications with or from aircraft, i.e. aeronautical mobile service
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/12 specially adapted for proprietary or special-purpose networking environments, e.g. medical networks, sensor networks, networks in vehicles or remote metering networks
• CPC Class Codes: H04Q 9/00 Arrangements in telecontrol or telemetry systems for selectively calling a substation from a main station, in which substation desired apparatus is selected for applying a control signal thereto or for obtaining measured values therefrom
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/042 Public Land Mobile systems, e.g. cellular systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/12 WLAN [Wireless Local Area Networks]

Abstract

A health management unit for an aircraft and method of monitoring health information of an aircraft and transmitting information from the aircraft including determining capabilities of one or more radios onboard the aircraft, selecting one of the multiple radios to transmit the transmission based, and transmitting the transmission utilizing the selected radio.

Claims

1. A method of monitoring health information of an aircraft and transmitting information from the aircraft, comprising:

determining, by a management unit, a priority level of a health information transmission;

determining, by the management unit, capabilities of at least two radios of different protocols onboard the aircraft, wherein the capabilities comprises of;

operative or inoperative status, currently transmitting status, and availability during current portion of a flight plan;

selecting, by the management unit, one of the at least two radios to transmit the health information transmission based on at least the determined priority level of the health information transmission and the capabilities of the at least two radios; and

transmitting the health information transmission utilizing the selected radio.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the selecting comprises selecting one of the at least two radios based on the determined priority level, availability of the at least two radios, content of the health information transmission, and size of the health information transmission.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the availability of the at least two radios comprises a current utilization of the at least two radios.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the selecting comprises selecting one of the at least two radios based on the determined priority level and a stage of flight determination.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein the selecting further comprises selecting one of the at least two radios based on cost rules.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein the transmitting further comprises transmitting a short message that more data will be coming later via a cheaper or more appropriate method.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the selecting further comprises selecting one of the at least two radios based on the determined capabilities of the at least two radios.

8. The method of claim 1 wherein determining the capabilities of the at least two radios comprises determining the availability of the at least two radios.

9. The method of claim 1, further comprising creating, by the management unit, the health information transmission based on information from at least one system or component of the aircraft.

10. The method of claim 1 wherein the selecting further comprises assessing multiple factors in selecting the one of the at least two radios.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein the multiple factors are repeatedly assessed.

12. A health management unit for an aircraft having multiple systems for operating the aircraft and multiple radios operating on different protocols for transmitting a message off the aircraft, the health management unit comprising:

a health management module receiving health-related information from one or more of the multiple systems, and creating a health-related message from at least some of the health-related information along with a corresponding priority level; and

a communication module controlling assignment and transmission of the health-related message to one of the multiple radios operating on different protocols based on capabilities of the multiple radios, wherein the capabilities comprises of;

operative or inoperative status, currently transmitting status, and availability during current portion of a flight plan, and priority of the health-related message.

13. The health management unit of claim 12 wherein the assignment and transmission of the health-related message is further based on cost, bandwidth, availability, and current utilization.

14. The health management unit of claim 12 wherein the health management module determines the priority level from a list of predetermined priority levels including a highest priority, a second highest priority, a third highest priority and a lowest priority.

15. The health management unit of claim 12 wherein the multiple radios comprise voice, ACARS-analog, ACARS-digital, SATCOM, Cellular, and WIFi.