The Boeing Company

Marianne Elizabeth Wilkinson

Shane Edward Arthur

Daniel J Cowan

Bart Stevens

Madhavadas Ramnath

Gerald E Mabson

Mark W Cleary

Daniel James Cowan

A fuel tank protection system having an outer wall for a fuel tank, an inner wall for the fuel tank, a gap between the inner wall and outer wall, and an intumescent material located within the gap between the inner wall and the outer wall.

Fuel tank flammability protection system

Methods and structural gap filler for one up assembly of structures. Drilling debris generated between the first component and the second component during drilling of an injection hole are encapsulated by injecting a structural gap filler through the injection hole and between the first component and the second component.

Methods and structural gap filler for one-up assembly

An apparatus is provided for predicting propagation of a crack in a structure. A finite element model is provided that represents the layers of the structure by meshes of elements having interfaces defined between adjacent elements in orthogonal potential crack planes. Overlapping interface elements are defined at the interfaces and include a plurality of node pairs spaced apart along multiple interfaces and having a node cluster therebetween that includes bound node pairs. The nodes of each node pair are coincident with respective nodes of the adjacent elements on opposite sides of the interface. An analysis of the finite element model under an external load is performed in which a crack tip is established at a node cluster. A strain energy release rate between the nodes of the bound node pairs of the node cluster is calculated and based thereon propagation of the crack is identified.

Finite element modeling and analysis of crack propagation in multiple planes of a structure

Growing community of inventors

Redmond, WA, United States of America

Marianne Elizabeth Wilkinson