Textron Innovations Inc.

Bell Textron Inc.

Bell Helicopter Textron Inc.

Colton James Gilliland

Russell Lee Mueller

Tyson Henry

Mark Alan Przybyla

Eric Stephen Olson

David Russell Bockmiller

James Everett Kooiman

George Ryan Decker

Jeffrey Matthew Williams

Michael E Rinehart

Clegg Smith

Christopher Edward Foskey

Douglas Robert Mueller

A bearing restraint, for use on a rotorcraft with a rotor mast and bearing assembly. The bearing restraint interfacing with a mast groove along the rotor mast to longitudinally restrain the bearing assembly. The bearing restraint includes a pilot ring, groove collar, and retaining ring.

Bearing restraint for use on a rotor mast

A cam-locking system for use with a retractable driveshaft that includes a housing, a cam carrier located at least partially in the housing, and a cam rotatably coupled to the cam carrier. Translation of the cam carrier along a central axis allows the cam to rotate into cooperative engagement with a catch recess on an interior surface of the housing, preventing the cam carrier from translating backwards, and thereby maintaining the retractable driveshaft in an engaged position. Further advancement of the cam carrier allows that cam to rotate into and unlocking gap in the interior surface of the housing, which enables the cam carrier to translate backwards along the central axis below the locked position, thereby disengaging the retractable driveshaft.

Cam-locking system for a retractable driveshaft and method for use thereof

An embodiment of the present invention provides an aircraft that includes a fuselage and a rotatable wing disposed above the fuselage. At least one cross-wing driveshaft is disposed within the wing and is driven in rotation by a drive system connected to first and second engines that are located at respective sides of the fuselage beneath the wing. The drive system is so configured that one or both of the first engine and the second engine can drive the at least one cross-wing driveshaft in the event of failure of an engine.

Stowable wing aircraft with dual, fuselage-mounted engines

A planetary gear system is provided in one example embodiment and may include a planet gear further comprising a bearing system, the bearing system further comprising an inner bearing assembly comprising a spherical bearing and an outer race; an outer bearing assembly comprising a plurality of cylindrical roller bearings, an inner race, and an outer race; and a race element comprising an inner surface and an outer surface, wherein the outer surface of the race element is the inner race for the outer bearing assembly and the inner surface of the race element is associated with the outer race for the inner bearing assembly.

Spherical mounted cylindrical roller bearing system

Briefly, the disclosure relates to apparatuses and methods to form a gearbox enclosure comprising an external liner, an internal liner, and a variable porosity region disposed between the external liner and the internal liner. The variable porosity region may be configured to accommodate flow of the lubricant, thereby providing a capability to cool, for example, a lubricating fluid at an elevated temperature.

Variable porosity load-bearing and heat-dissipating aircraft structures

A gear system includes a gear assembly having a shaft that is at least partially disposed within a housing of the gear system. A thrust bearing has inner and outer races with the outer race coupled to the housing. A bearing flexure is disposed between the inner race of the thrust bearing and the shaft. The bearing flexure includes a cylindrical cage having at least one shaft journal ring and a plurality of circumferentially distributed axially extending fingers coupled thereto with the shaft journal ring coupled to the shaft. A cylindrical bearing journal has inner and outer surfaces with the outer surface coupled to the inner race of the thrust bearing. Each of a plurality of circumferentially distributed radially extending struts extends between one of the fingers and the inner surface of the cylindrical bearing journal. The bearing flexure has an axial stiffness that is greater than its radial stiffness.

Gear systems having bearing flexure mounted thrust bearings

Various implementations described herein are directed to an emergency lubrication system for a tiltrotor aircraft. The emergency lubrication system includes a pressurized material chamber, a lubrication chamber, a first valve between the pressurized material chamber and the lubrication chamber, a gearbox, and a second valve between the lubrication chamber and the gearbox. The first valve is configured to operate in a first mode when the emergency lubrication system is in a first configuration and a second mode when the emergency lubrication system is in a second configuration.

Emergency lubrication system for tiltrotor aircraft

A drivetrain for an aircraft includes an engine, a driveshaft receiving rotational energy from the engine and a gearbox including a planetary gear system receiving rotational energy from the driveshaft. The planetary gear system includes a sun gear, planet gears, a ring gear and an integral carrier forming flexured carrier posts. Each flexured carrier post supports a respective one of the planet gears and has a fixed proximal end and a cantilevered distal end. The planetary gear system includes flexured roller races, each having a fixed end and a cantilevered end. The fixed end of each flexured roller race is coupled to the cantilevered distal end of a respective flexured carrier post. The planet gears engage with the flexured roller races to rotate about the flexured carrier posts. The cantilevered ends of the flexured roller races experience cantilevered motion to absorb loads from the planet gears.

Integral flexured carriers for aircraft planetary gear systems

An exemplary tiltrotor aircraft with a hybrid drive system includes a first propulsion system having a first engine and a first supplemental driver operably coupled to a first proprotor that is operable between a helicopter mode and an airplane mode and a second propulsion system having a second engine and a second supplemental driver operably coupled to a second proprotor that is operable between a helicopter mode and an airplane mode.

Hybrid tiltrotor drive system

A tiltrotor aircraft includes a propulsion system with a fixed engine and a rotatable proprotor. The engine is located below the wing of the tiltrotor aircraft, and the rotatable proprotor assembly is mounted on the top surface of the wing. The engine and proprotor assembly are connected via a series of one or more gearboxes that route the engine output from the engine to the proprotor.

Engine and rotatable proprotor configurations for a tiltrotor aircraft

Embodiments are directed to a selectable drive system that allows a rotor gearbox to send torque to a proprotor assembly and/or through a multiplier planetary gear set to a pylon-mounted ducted fan thrust unit. The rotor drive system may be a stop-fold system in which rotor blades can be folded when not rotating. This allows a normally idle lift engine to provide additional aircraft thrust during cruise where an aircraft is typically using only a dedicated thrust engine for high speed flight. An inline engage/disengage actuator or 'shift fork' on the rotor gearbox is used to select the torque-output direction. The multiplier planetary gear set increases the output RPM that is received from the rotor gearbox and that is applied to the thrust fan unit.

Lift engine auxiliary thrust system for stop fold aircraft

A drivetrain for an aircraft includes an engine, a driveshaft to receive rotational energy from the engine and a gearbox including a multistage planetary gear system to receive rotational energy from the driveshaft. The multistage planetary gear system includes an integral multistage ring gear system having flanged and cantilevered ends. The integral multistage ring gear system forms a first stage ring gear at the cantilevered end and a second stage ring gear interposed between the flanged end and the first stage ring gear. The multistage planetary gear system includes a first stage sun gear, first stage planet gears and a first stage carrier. The first stage planet gears mate with the first stage ring gear. The multistage planetary gear system includes a second stage sun gear, second stage planet gears and a second stage carrier. The second stage planet gears mate with the second stage ring gear.

Integral multistage ring gear systems for aircraft

A tiltrotor aircraft includes a propulsion system with a fixed engine and a rotatable proprotor. The engine is located on the top surface of the wing of the tiltrotor aircraft, and the rotatable proprotor assembly is also mounted on the top surface of the wing. The engine and proprotor assembly are connected via a series of one or more gearboxes that route the engine output from the engine to the proprotor.

Growing community of inventors

Northlake, TX, United States of America

Colton James Gilliland