Identifying Nonconformities and Improving Traceability of Attachments and Components during Airframe Construction

Abstract

STELIA Aerospace manufacture and produce sections of aircraft. In order to increase productivity and improve the reliability of the products being delivered, STELIA Aerospace wished to set up a control system that would be used during the assembly of its products as an in-process check. The goal was to eliminate errors from missing or incorrectly located components. Entities to be checked include clips, brackets, supports, and the presence of open holes. At the beginning of this project, a manual quality check was carried out visually by quality inspectors. Each inspector had to identify and report several hundred items for each aircraft section. STELIA Aerospace investigated several potential solutions to provide greater control. These included laser trackers and other advanced metrology systems. However since complete CAD models were not available for all components being mounted to the airframe, some dimensional checks were not possible. In addition, the key issue was not measuring the attachments, but carefully verifying their presence and ensuring integrity of the assembly. An innovative and non-conventional solution was developed using an automated directional zoom vision system coupled with a motorized lighting unit. This approach made it possible for STELIA Aerospace to carry out these visual operations automatically. The solution is based on an automated search for differences between a reference image and an acquired one.