Patent ID: 9382017
Filing Date: 2016-07-05
CPC Classification: B29C,B64F,Y10T

Claim Text:
1. A method of repairing an aircraft structural component, which has a component fault in a portion adjoining a cavity of the aircraft structural component, wherein the method comprises the following steps: removing a region of the aircraft structural component that has the component fault, introducing a bearing element into the cavity of the aircraft structural component through an opening, which has been formed in the aircraft structural component by the removal of the region of the aircraft structural component that has the component fault, in such a way that a bearing surface of the bearing element comes to lie against a region, adjacent to the opening, of an inner surface of the aircraft structural component facing the cavity of the aircraft structural component, fixing the bearing element in its position in the cavity of the aircraft structural component, and closing the opening by means of a repair material, wherein bearing element comprises an expansion anchor, which while being introduced through the opening into the cavity of the aircraft structural component is in a first non-expanded position and which in the cavity of the aircraft structural component is brought into a second expanded position, in which the bearing surface formed on the expansion anchor of the bearing element may be brought to lie against the region, adjacent to the opening, of the inner surface of the aircraft structural component facing the cavity of the aircraft structural component, and wherein the expansion anchor comprises two swivel elements pivotable relative to one another about a swiveling axis and each carrying a portion of the bearing surface, the expansion anchor brought from its first non-expanded position into its second expanded position by pivoting the two swivel elements relative to one another about the swiveling axis, and wherein the region of the aircraft structural component that has the component fault is removed in steps such that a cross-section of the opening formed in the aircraft structural component by removal of the region of the aircraft structural component having the component fault increases stepwise from an inner surface of the aircraft structural component that adjoins the cavity of the aircraft structural component in the direction of an outer surface of the aircraft structural component that faces away from the cavity of the aircraft structural component, and wherein the bearing surface is at least in sections provided with a surface layer of the same material as the repair material, and the repair material is joined through the opening to the surface layer.