Numerical simulation and analysis of lightning indirect effects on helicopter

Lightning protection tests on aircrafts include direct effects tests and indirect effects tests. Indirect effects tests include aircraft tests, equipment/system tests and etc. However, the aircraft tests of indirect effects are usually hard to be performed due to high costs of tests equipment and strictness of tests requirement. A simulation of aircraft indirect-effects tests on helicopter, according to SAE-ARP5416/5412 tests method, is carried out using Transmission Line Matrix (TLM) method. The simulation predicts surface currents on fuselage, electromagnetic environment outside and inside the fuselage and induced currents in avionics cable. The results indicate that the method is able to be applied to simulate indirect effects on helicopter effectively and can be utilized to optimize the lightning-protection design on helicopters.