This paper is concerned with computational methods for life prediction of payload structures using air-carry environmental data from a health and usage monitoring system (HUMS) mounted on an aircraft and monitored continuously throughout the air-carry life of the payload. Here, payload refers to any equipment such as munitions carried by the aircraft for the performance of a particular mission, and life is interpreted as referring to the remaining air-carry fatigue life of the payload structure and its structural components. Literature searches have been carried out, but little has been found specifically on health and usage monitoring for predicting fatigue life of payloads. However, there is a much wider literature on monitoring for life prediction of structural components of aircraft, and particularly rotorcraft, which becomes directly applicable by simply regarding the payload as a structural component of an aircraft, but without the possibility of monitoring. This paper, by reference to other people's work on life prediction of aircraft structures, described in the literature, develops the understanding of the problem and how it might be addressed for payload structures, and presents a review of computational methods previously used or proposed. Recommendations for the preferred tools and methods, catering for both metallic and composite structures, most likely to be applicable to this study are made.
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