Michael Davis and Jon Ziulkowski have designed and implemented magneto safety guards for the Piper Archer aircraft in Purdue University’s fleet. Davis is the director of aircraft maintenance, and Ziulkowski is a senior lecturer and Part 141 flight operations quality assessment manager in the School of Aviation and Transportation Technology in Purdue’s Polytechnic college.
A magneto is a self-contained electrical generator that provides spark plugs in an aircraft’s internal combustion engine with the energy needed to ignite the fuel-air mixture. When the magneto switch is on, the craft’s engine and propeller remain on with no external indication of their status. The design by Davis and Ziulkowski ensures that student pilots and maintenance personnel who approach an aircraft know its engine and propeller are turned off.
“The guard is a clip that fits over the magneto switch at the top of the flight deck only when it is turned off,” Ziulkowski said. “While the clip is in place, the engine cannot be powered on; when the engine is on, the clip cannot be placed over the switch. A footlong ‘remove before flight’ ribbon attached to the clip provides a visual indication to people outside the flight deck that the clip is in place.”
The patent-pending safety guard is available for licensing by industry partners interested in commercializing it. See the full Purdue Research News story by Steve Martin for more details about the invention.
Additional information
- Purdue aviation experts create safety guard for Piper Archer aircraft in the Purdue fleet (Purdue Research News)