Ground vibration test of a commercial aircraft

Test organizations are facing increasing challenges for improving test efficiency to reduce test costs and meet schedule requirements. This paper addresses the ground vibration testing of a commercial aircraft in Long Beach, California. Both sine and random testing were performed on the entire aircraft, as well as specific critical components. The coordination of the test teams, parallel setup procedures, optimized test sequences, new data systems, and customized data acquisition and processing procedures have greatly improved test efficiency. Discussions on test setup, instrumentation, test methodologies, and test results are presented in this paper.