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Aircraft Lightning Environment and Related Test Waveforms
- Aerospace Standard
- ARP5412B
- Revised
Downloadable datasets available
Annotation ability available
Sector:
Issuing Committee:
Language:
English
Scope
The environment and test waveforms defined in this SAE Aerospace Recommended Practice (ARP) account for the best lightning data and analysis currently available. The quantified environment and levels herein represent the minimum currently required by certifying authorities, consistent with the approach applied in related lightning documents.
Lightning, like other weather phenomenon, is probabilistic in nature. Levels and waveforms vary considerably from one flash to the next. Within this document, standardized voltage and current waveforms have been derived to represent the lightning environment external to an aircraft. These standardized waveforms are used to assess the effects of lightning on aircraft. The standardized external current waveforms have in turn been used to derive standardized transient voltage and current test waveforms that can be expected to appear on cable bundles and at equipment interfaces within an aircraft. When deriving these latter internal induced test waveforms, considerations such as testability and important waveform characteristics that can demonstrate lightning design effectiveness, have been taken into account.
The parameters of the standardized waveforms, both external and derived internal induced transients, represent severe versions of each of the characteristics of natural lightning flashes and include all parameters of interest with respect to lightning protection for aircraft. These standardized waveforms are thus referred to as idealized standard lightning environment waveforms, idealized standard waveforms, or just idealized waveforms within this document. The waveforms associated with the external environment are termed, the idealized standard external lightning environment. The waveforms associated with the internal induced environment are termed the idealized standard induced transient waveforms.
In every case more severe versions of each of the individual characteristics of the idealized standard external lightning environment waveforms have been recorded in natural lightning flashes. The more severe individual characteristics of the idealized standard external lightning environment waveforms have never been recorded together within a single lightning flash. Therefore the parameters combined in the idealized standard lightning environment waveforms provided in this document represent a very severe environment.
The waveforms provided in this ARP are considered to be adequate for the demonstration of compliance for the protection of an aircraft and its systems against the lightning environment and should be applied in accordance with the aircraft lightning strike zones (see ARP5414) and test methods (see ARP5416), and applicable FAA and EASA advisory and interpretive material.
Rationale
This revision was published to update the certification lightning environment as required to reflect the current state of knowledge and address issues as identified by the aerospace community. This involved the update of lightning parameter information and the modification of the standard waveforms.
Due to the extensive re-work and re-organization of this revision the standard ‘change bar’ indications for the changes are not shown; therefore, an ‘R’ has been placed before the document title.
Recommended Content
| Aerospace Standard | Aircraft Lightning Test Methods |
| Aerospace Standard | Aircraft Lightning Zone |
Topic
Data Sets - Support Documents
| Title | Description | Download |
|---|---|---|
| Unnamed Dataset 1 | ||
| Unnamed Dataset 2 | ||
| Unnamed Dataset 3 | ||
| TABLE 1 | PARAMETERS FOR NEGATIVE LIGHTNING FLASHES MEASURED AT GROUND | |
| TABLE 2 | PARAMETERS FOR POSITIVE LIGHTNING FLASHES MEASURED AT GROUND | |
| Unnamed Dataset 6 | ||
| TABLE 3 | APPLICATION OF LIGHTNING ENVIRONMENT TO AIRCRAFT ZONES | |
| TABLE 4 | RESPONSE TO D AND D/2 AS A FRACTION IN RESPONSE TO A | |
| TABLE 5 | INDIVIDUAL CONDUCTOR TCL, ETDL OR TEST LEVELS DUE TO CURRENT COMPONENT A | |
| TABLE 6 | CABLE BUNDLE TCL, ETDL OR TEST LEVELS DUE TO CURRENT COMPONENT A | |
| TABLE 7 | CABLE BUNDLE TCL, ETDL OR MB TEST LEVELS DUE TO CURRENT COMPONENT H | |
| TABLE 8 | IDEALIZED LIGHTNING CURRENT COMPONENT MATHEMATICAL EXPRESSION PARAMETER VALUES | |
| TABLE 9 | IDEALIZED LIGHTNING CURRENT COMPONENT WAVEFORM NORM VALUES | |
| TABLE 10 | SUMMARY OF INDUCED TRANSIENT WAVEFORM PARAMETERS | |
| Unnamed Dataset 15 | ||
| TABLE A1 | NEGATIVE LIGHTNING FLASH: NUMBER OF STROKES (MULTIPLICITY) | |
| TABLE A2 | NEGATIVE LIGHTNING FLASH: TIME INTERVAL BETWEEN STROKES (ms) | |
| TABLE A3 | NEGATIVE LIGHTNING FLASH: FLASH DURATION (ms) | |
| TABLE A4 | NEGATIVE LIGHTNING FLASH: CHARGE IN FLASH (C) | |
| TABLE A5 | NEGATIVE FIRST RETURN STROKE: PEAK CURRENT (kA) | |
| TABLE A6 | NEGATIVE FIRST RETURN STROKE: PEAK RATE-OF-RISE (kA/μs) | |
| TABLE A7 | NEGATIVE FIRST RETURN STROKE: FRONT DURATION (μS) | |
| TABLE A8 | NEGATIVE FIRST RETURN STROKE: STROKE DURATION (μS) | |
| TABLE A9 | NEGATIVE FIRST RETURN STROKE: TOTAL STROKE CHARGE (C) | |
| TABLE A10 | NEGATIVE FIRST RETURN STROKE: IMPULSE CHARGE (C) | |
| TABLE A11 | NEGATIVE FIRST RETURN STROKE: ACTION INTEGRAL (A s) | |
| TABLE A12 | NEGATIVE SUBSEQUENT STROKE: PEAK CURRENT (KA) | |
| TABLE A13 | NEGATIVE SUBSEQUENT STROKE: PEAK RATE-FOR-RISE (kA/μs) | |
| TABLE A14 | NEGATIVE SUBSEQUENT STROKE: FRONT DURATION (μS) | |
| TABLE A15 | NEGATIVE SUBSEQUENT STROKE: STROKE DURATION (μS) | |
| TABLE A16 | NEGATIVE SUBSEQUENT STROKE: TOTAL STROKE CHARGE (C) | |
| TABLE A17 | NEGATIVE SUBSEQUENT STROKE: IMPULSE CHARGE (C) | |
| TABLE A18 | NEGATIVE SUBSEQUENT STROKE: ACTION INTEGRAL (A s) | |
| TABLE A19 | NEGATIVE FLASH CONTINUING CURRENT: AMPLITUDE (A) | |
| TABLE A20 | NEGATIVE FLASH CONTINUING CURRENT: DURATION (ms) | |
| TABLE A21 | NEGATIVE FLASH CONTINUING CURRENT: CHARGE (C) | |
| Unnamed Dataset 37 | ||
| TABLE A22 | POSITIVE LIGHTNING FLASH: FLASH DURATION (ms) | |
| TABLE A23 | POSITIVE LIGHTNING FLASH: TOTAL CHARGE (C) | |
| TABLE A24 | POSITIVE LIGHTNING STROKE: PEAK CURRENT (kA) | |
| TABLE A25 | POSITIVE LIGHTNING STROKE: PEAK RATE-OF-RISE (kA/μs) | |
| TABLE A26 | POSITIVE LIGHTNING STROKE: FRONT DURATION (μS) | |
| TABLE A27 | POSITIVE LIGHTNING STROKE: STROKE DURATION (μS) | |
| TABLE A28 | POSITIVE LIGHTNING STROKE: IMPULSE CHARGE (C) | |
| TABLE A29 | POSITIVE LIGHTNING STROKE: ACTION INTEGRAL (A s) |
Issuing Committee
SAE AE-2 LIGHTNING COMMITTEE It is the duty of the AE-2 committee to produce advisory materials for the aerospace community in the following areas:
The natural lightning environment and related environment standards Protection of aerospace vehicles from the effects of lightning and other atmospheric electrical environments. Means of verifying the adequacy of protection measures. Standardized and other atmospheric electrical environments for lightning simulation and test methods.Reference
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