United States of America As Represented by the Secretary of the Air Force

Juan Soto

Kimberly Wilkerson

Casey Johnson

A stand for holding an aircraft workpiece during maintenance. The stand has a pair of longitudinally spaced apart uprights, an elongate, longitudinal, vertically placeable spine connecting the pair of uprights, an elongate, transversely oriented, longitudinally placeable spreader disposed on the first spine and at least one transversely placeable slider disposed on the first spine spreader. At least one fixture is disposed on each slider. The fixture is adapted to hold a removably workpiece in fixed relationship relative to an operator. The uprights, spines and spreaders provide three-axis vertical, longitudinal and transverse placement of the fixture, respectively.

Stand for holding a workpiece with three-axis adjustability

A brake in combination with a slider for holding an aircraft workpiece in position for maintenance. The combination has a slider which circumscribes and moves on a support bar and a brake configured to lock the slider in place on the support bar. The brake has a brake pad internal to the slider and at least partially congruent with the support bar. The brake pad is engageable and disengageable from the support bar by respective insertion and retraction of a key pin extending outwardly from the wall of the slider. The key pin and the brake pad are connected by a driver pin, so that insertion of the key pin towards the support bar urges the driver pin towards the support bar and the brake pad into locking contact with the support bar. A method of locking an aircraft workpiece in position for maintenance is also disclosed. The method comprises the steps of: providing a stand having X, Y, Z adjustability of a fixture for holding the aircraft workpiece moving a slider to a predetermined position on a spreader, locking the slider the in the predetermined maintenance position with a brake and joining an aircraft workpiece to the fixture.

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Oklahoma City, OK, United States of America

Juan Soto