Smart Tightening Development for Aeronautical Bolted Assemblies in an Industry 4.0

Abstract

Smart tightening development is part of the Industry 4.0 transformation with the introduction of smart tools, and preload in bolted assemblies is of major interest in today’s aircraft manufacturing process. So far, it has been difficult to estimate the importance of each parameter for tightening process quality, mainly because of the large number of combinations and configurations that exist. The present work aims at evaluating the effects and the interactions between different parameters that have to be taken in consideration in future torquing strategy. Many experimental tests have been conducted on an Automatica test bench using a Taguchi strategy and an analysis of the first main results is now presented, highlighting the complexity of the phenomena studied. All these points will help us to better understand tightening, so as to improve performance during installation, maintenance and repair.