Cabling of an aircraft circuit breaker panel

A distribution panel aboard an aircraft includes sites intended for the installation of functional electrical circuit breakers of which at least one of the sites is not occupied by a functional circuit breaker. The functional circuit breakers are wired up to a monitoring system via monitoring cabling so as to monitor a state of the circuit breakers. The at least one site not occupied by a functional circuit breaker is occupied by a nonfunctional circuit breaker, termed a false circuit breaker. The false circuit breaker is able to deliver a state signal and is wired up to the monitoring system by the monitoring cabling in a manner identical to that of a functional circuit breaker.

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION

This application is entitled to and claims the benefit of French Application No. FR 2011 60961 filed Nov. 30, 2012, the disclosure of which including the specification, drawings and abstract is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.

FIELD

The present invention relates to an electrical distribution panel aboard an aircraft comprising circuit breakers monitored by means of cabling for monitoring the state of the said circuit breakers. More particularly, the invention relates to a distribution panel comprising is standardized monitoring cabling allowing the addition or the removal, subsequently, of circuit breakers without requiring modification of the said monitoring cabling.

BACKGROUND

Aboard modern aircraft, when an electrical device is installed, be it for example a computer or in general any electrical consumer, a circuit breaker is used to protect its electrical circuit against overloads or short-circuits.

The circuit breakers, which may exceed several hundred in number, are arranged in matrix fashion, in rows and columns, on distribution panels10, as illustrated inFIG. 1, the said panels being installed mainly in the flight deck or the holds.

When an aircraft is in service or if its definition at an advanced stage of its manufacture is altered and additional electrical devices have to be installed, it is necessary to add circuit breakers.

The panels are therefore designed, when the aircraft is put into service, to be able to receive additional circuit breakers. The said panels thus comprise free sites for receiving these circuit breakers when electrical devices are added.

Furthermore, having regard to the large number of circuit breakers and the non-accessibility of certain distribution panels in the course of the flight of the aircraft, such as those situated in the holds of the aircraft, a monitoring system is used to permanently check the state of each circuit breaker. Upon a change of state of a circuit breaker, the monitoring system informs the other systems and the pilot of the status, and in particular of the changes of states, of the circuit breakers, which act so as to take into account the consequences of this change of state.

To carry out this state monitoring of the circuit breakers, a cabling of the circuit breakers according to rows and columns is commonly used in such a way that reading an item of information according to a row and a column gives the state of the circuit breaker which is positioned at the intersection of the said row and the said column.

When a modification has to be performed, for example, the addition or the removal of an electrical device, a prevailing solution consists in adding or removing the associated circuit breaker or circuit breakers on the distribution panel. Each modification also entails a modification of the cables for monitoring the state of the circuit breakers. Thus, when a circuit breaker is added or removed, the associated monitoring cables are likewise added, removed or replaced. These various modifications give rise to very different cabling between aircraft, which is perpetually being altered and is relatively expensive as regards the time required to install or deinstall the monitoring cables, depending on the presence or otherwise of circuit breakers.

SUMMARY

The present invention proposes a distribution panel that is standardized at the level of the matrix cabling for monitoring the circuit breakers which does not require any modification of the monitoring cabling when adding or removing circuit breakers.

According to the invention, a distribution panel aboard an aircraft comprises sites intended for the installation of functional electrical circuit breakers of which at least one of the sites is not occupied by a functional circuit breaker, in which certain functional circuit breakers are wired up to a monitoring system by means of monitoring cabling so as to monitor a state of the said circuit breakers, and the at least one site not occupied by a functional circuit breaker is occupied by a nonfunctional circuit breaker, termed a false circuit breaker, the said false circuit breaker being able to deliver a state signal and being wired up to the monitoring system by the monitoring cabling in a manner identical to that of a functional circuit breaker.

In order to guarantee interchangeability between the functional circuit breakers and the false circuit breakers without damaging the monitoring cables, the false circuit breaker comprises terminals, for receiving the said monitoring cabling, and arranged geometrically in a manner substantially identical to the terminals of a functional circuit breaker.

In one embodiment, the state signal delivered by the false circuit breaker corresponds to one of the state signals delivered by the functional circuit breaker. The state signal delivered by the false circuit breaker may be either enabled or disabled.

In another embodiment, the state signal delivered by the false circuit breaker corresponds to a different signal from the signals that may be delivered by the functional circuit breaker.

Advantageously, the false circuit breaker comprises a selector for determining the state signal delivered by the said false circuit breaker. The selector may be for example an on/off switch with two states, enabled or disabled.

Preferably, the monitoring cables are defined, at the level of the functional circuit breaker, by an identification number making it possible to associate the functional circuit breaker with the device with which it is associated, and are identified, at the level of the false circuit breaker, not associated with a device, by a provisional identification number. In an exemplary embodiment, the said provisional identification number is defined by a row-wise and column-wise position of the false circuit breaker.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION

An electrical distribution panel10in an aircraft in accordance with the invention, as illustrated inFIG. 2, comprises sites11, positioned in a matrix manner in rows and columns, able to receive circuit breakers. Some of the said sites11comprise functional circuit breakers20for protecting the electrical devices (not represented) with which they are associated.

Furthermore, the said panel comprises, at at least one site11, a nonfunctional element, termed a false circuit breaker30, when the said site is not occupied by a functional circuit breaker20.

The distribution panel10is advantageously coupled up to all the sites11designed to receive the circuit breakers.

A power supply cabling21for the device is wired up to corresponding functional circuit breakers20. The said power supply cabling21is linked to each functional circuit breaker20, for example at the level of the terminals1and2, in the case of a circuit comprising only one power supply cable, as illustrated inFIG. 2. Circuits comprising several power supply cables, as for example a three-phase circuit (not represented), can also be associated with a circuit breaker20.

The functional circuit breakers20and the false circuit breakers30are wired up by means of cables40,50termed monitoring cables, to a system (not represented) for monitoring the state of the circuit breakers.

This monitoring cabling is not constraining to effect as regards the choice of the monitoring cables40,50since all the monitoring cables are identical independently of the rating of the circuit breakers installed. On principle, a circuit breaker's monitoring cables intended to gather a state signal of the said circuit breaker do not depend, as regards their characteristics, in particular the cross-section, on the type of circuit breaker installed, in particular the rating. Consequently, the monitoring cables40,50may be installed without knowing the present or future characteristics of the circuit breaker.

The monitoring cables40,50are organized row-wise and column-wise, in accordance with the arrangement of the circuit breakers.

The monitoring cabling is effected in such a way that at one and the same time the said cabling links terminals3a,5aof the functional circuit breakers20and terminals3b,5bof the false circuit breakers30.

More precisely, the monitoring cable40links together electrically all those terminals3aof the circuit breakers20and3bof the false circuit breakers30that are situated in one and the same column. Advantageously, the said terminals are linked in series.

In a similar manner, the cabling50links together electrically all those terminals5aof the circuit breakers20and5bof the false circuit breakers30that are situated in one and the same row. Advantageously, the said terminals are linked in series.

Each cable40,50is linked at one of these ends, generally by means for example, of a multiplexer or of a concentrator, to the monitoring system. The said monitoring system is thus able to analyse the state signal successively at the terminals of the functional circuit breaker20or false circuit breaker30at each row-column intersection and to deduce therefrom a state of the said functional circuit breaker20or false circuit breaker30at the said intersection.

The installation of the power supply cabling21for a device on the false circuit breakers is possible but turns out to be penalizing because of the weight and dimensions of the said power supply cabling even though the said cables are not used. Furthermore, the choice of the necessary cross-section of the power supply cabling21is arbitrary if the device having to be powered is not known.

In one embodiment, the terminals3a,5aof a functional circuit is breaker20correspond to the terminals of a switching means, for example an on/off switch, which is in an enabled state, for example a closed on/off switch, for a first state of the circuit breaker and in a disabled state, for example an open on/off switch, for a second state of the circuit breaker. Consequently, when the circuit breaker changes state, the switching means change enabled or disabled condition.

The false circuit breakers30not being associated with an electrical device, the said false circuit breakers deliver, at the terminals3b,5bwired up to the monitoring system, a constant state signal corresponding to an arbitrary choice. In a particular embodiment, the false circuit breaker30comprises, at the level of the terminals3band5b, a selector making it possible to choose the state of the signal returned by the false circuit breaker, for example enabled or disabled, so as to apply the designer's arbitrary choice.

In another embodiment, the predefined state of the false circuit breaker30corresponds to a third state. This third state, which does not correspond to any state, enabled or disabled, of a functional circuit breaker20allows the electronics of the monitoring system to identify the presence of the false circuit breaker30.

Advantageously, to guarantee interchangeability between the functional circuit breakers20and the false circuit breakers30without running the risk of damaging the electrical monitoring cables40,50, the false circuit breaker30comprises a rear face whose geometric shape and the layout of whose terminals3b,5bare substantially identical to that of a functional circuit breaker20.

Preferably, each monitoring cable40,50linked at the level of the terminals3a,5ato a circuit breaker20comprises a connection point21a,22adefined by an identification number making it possible to associate the functional circuit breaker20with the device to which it is linked. Thus, each connection point21a,22aof a monitoring cable40,50is identified by an identification number. The false circuit breakers30not being associated with a device, a provisional identification number is allocated to each connection point31b,32bof the monitoring cables40,50linked at the level of the terminals3b,5bto the false circuit breakers30.

In an exemplary embodiment, the distribution panel10comprising coordinates in terms of abscissa and ordinate serving to define the position of each site of the circuit breaker, the identification number of the is connection points31b,32bof the monitoring cables linked to the terminals3b,5bof a false circuit breaker30is advantageously defined by the coordinates of the site of the said false circuit breaker in the row-column matrix of the distribution panel10. By way of illustration, in the distribution panel10ofFIG. 1, the rows are numbered from 20 to 36 and the columns from 41 to 69. If a false circuit breaker30is positioned at the site situated in the 28th row and in the 65th column, the identification number allocated to this false circuit breaker30is then 2865.

Thus, the monitoring cabling may be defined without knowing the position of the functional circuit breakers20which will subsequently be installed.

Furthermore, at the level of each connection point31b,32b, each monitoring cable40,50comprises an identification number which will then be reassigned during the installation of a functional circuit breaker20at the site of a false circuit breaker30, without it being necessary to define and to install a new monitoring cable40,50.

Consequently, cabling for the state monitoring of the circuit breakers for all the sites on the distribution panels10, makes it possible to obtain identical panels for a given aircraft model and the addition or the removal of functional circuit breakers20is then carried out without modification of the said monitoring cabling for the distribution panel10.

When a functional circuit breaker20has to be added because of the installation of a new device, a first step consists, during the design of the modification, in renaming the identification number of the points of connection of the monitoring cables40,50as a function of the device attached to the functional circuit breaker20.

In a second step, the monitoring cables40,50are detached from the terminals3b,5bof the false circuit breaker30situated at the site that is to be occupied by the functional circuit breaker20to be installed. The false circuit breaker30is thereafter replaced with the functional circuit breaker20of the appropriate rating. The points of connection of the electrical monitoring cables, previously placed on standby at the level of the terminals3b,5bof the false circuit breaker30, are recoupled respectively at the level of the terminals3a,5a. In a third step, in order to render operational the detection of the state of the new circuit breaker, all the elements of the monitoring system which check the state of the circuit breakers are updated, as a function of the new definition of the distribution panel10.