A pressure fatigue test of an airplane composite door in the framework of the European research program MAAXIMUS was performed in the test lab of IMA Dresden. The purpose of this test was to validate a new door design under cabin pressurization taking into consideration the deformations of the door surround structure. The composite door consisted of a CRFP structure including new joining technologies like stitching for further aircraft application. It was designed and manufactured by Latecoere. The target for the validation process was to demonstrate the resistance to low-cycle fatigue of the composite structure with respect to 3 DSG and to show the damage tolerance behaviour of the design. In total 180.000 flight cycles were simulated during the fatigue test. In regular intervals inspections of the door structure were performed. The tested composite door withstands the simulated fatigue loading without any findings. Furthermore, a damage growth campaign of 30.000 flight cycles with single element failure and a fatigue test with an included repair solution of additional 20.000 flight cycles were realized. At the end of the test campaign, the residual strength behaviour of the door structure was investigated.
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