Reliability Analysis, Design Improvements and Maintenance Procedure Compilation of a Novel Remotely Piloted Helicopter

Abstract

In the present paper, a complete process from reliability evaluation to design modification is proposed and also applied to a newly designed and manufactured Remotely Piloted Helicopter (RPH) by the authors. First of all, a description of all platform subsystems is presented. After that, function diagram and also product tree of the whole system is depicted for further analysis. Then, the reliability of all parts and components are calculated through standard methods. The procedure is followed by FMEA/FMECA execution and determination of critical components and failures. Then, the reliability of the whole platform is calculated using standard block diagrams. Finally, in order to improve the mission operational reliability of the considered RPH, some modifications are implemented to the platform including configuration and mechanisms design changes.