Date: 8 February 2017
RTCA Paper No. 039-17/SC235-013
Summary of the 6th Meeting
Special Committee 235 - Non-Rechargeable Lithium Batteries
Meeting Summary:
The 6th Plenary Meeting of Special Committee 235 (SC-235) was held on January 25, 2017. This plenary
was conducted as a Virtual Meeting with the following attendees participating via WebEx:
John Trela (Chairman)
Norman Pereira (Designated Federal Official)
Jeff Densmore (Secretary)
Karan Hofmann (Program Director)
The Boeing Company (*)
Federal Aviation Administration (*)
Radiant Power Corporation (*)
RTCA, Inc.
Antonio Chiesa
James Christo
Claude Cresp
Alex Haynes
Stuart Inkpen
Nazih Khaouly
Frederic Menard
Bradford Miller
John Nielsen
Andre Oliveira
Paul Pfeifer
Jim Russell
Leire Segura Martinez de Ilarduya
Adrian Sfetcu
Harmohan Singh
Carl Story
Steve Summer
David Swartzendruber
Aziz Tazi
Clayton Vondrasek
Transport Canada (*)
NASA (*)
ELTA (*)
DME Corporation (*)
Instrumar Limited (*)
Federal Aviation Administration (*)
Orolia (*)
Federal Aviation Administration (*)
Ultralife Corporation (*)
Embraer (*)
Textron (*)
The Boeing Company (*)
Airbus (*)
Bell Helicopter Canada (*)
Honeywell International Inc (*)
Gulfstream Aerospace Corporation (*)
Federal Aviation Administration (*)
Textron (*)
Transport Canada (*)
Garmin (*)
* Attended Virtually
In accordance with the Federal Aviation Advisory Committee Act, Norm Pereira, Federal Aviation
Administration, was the Designated Federal Official for this meeting.
Date: 8 February 2017
RTCA Paper No. 039-17/SC235-013
Opening Plenary
•
The 6th Plenary meeting of SC-235 was convened on January 25, 2017 at 9:00am EDT by Chair
John Trela (Boeing). Jeff Densmore (Radiant Power) was the SC-235 Recording Secretary.
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The Public Meeting Announcement was read by Norman Pereira, the Designated Federal Official.
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An RTCA overview, including RTCA’s Proprietary References Policy was read by Karan
Hofmann, the Program Director.
•
Welcoming remarks were made by John Trela. Each person in attendance was invited to introduce
themselves.
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The meeting agenda was reviewed and approved.
•
The Meeting Summary for SC-235 Plenary #5 was reviewed and approved with one minor change.
After discussing, it was requested that the following sentence removed from the “FAA Tech Center
Testing Update” paragraph: Data was provided TR’s triggered by heating and overcharging
including an average total released gas volume of approximately 1.5 liters and maximum battery
temperatures of 250ºC. The minutes have been updated accordingly and posted on Workspace.
•
There were no Open Action Items from the previous Plenary meeting
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All documents and presentation material reviewed during Plenary #6 has been uploaded and is
available on the RTCA Workspace at the following location:
http://workspace.rtca.org/apps/org/workgroup/sc235_nonrechargeble_lithium_batteries/documents.php?folder_id=6099
Final Review of DO-227A Draft Document
The SC-235 Working Group held numerous virtual WebEx meetings between Plenary #5 in November and
Plenary #6 to review of the final draft of DO-227A. During that period, one last round of comments were
requested from committee members, which were reviewed during these working group meetings. Several
items were deferred to Plenary #6 based on the nature of the comments and need for discussion with the
entire committee.
The entire DO-227A draft document was reviewed. Below is a quick summary of the significant items
discussed and their resolution:
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Battery Short Circuit with Protections Disabled (Paragraph 2.2.2.2.6). Some members expressed
opposition to disabling protections as part of this test. There were other questions regarding what
constitutes protection devices (e.g. are the required blocking diodes considered a protective device).
After much discussion the FAA stated that they adamant that this test is required to meet the Special
Conditions. Minor rewording was accomplished, but the requirement was generally left as written.
•
Conformity of Test Articles (Paragraph 2.3.6). This requirement was discussed at length, including
the allowance to modify the test article(s) as required by specific tests. The wording for this
Date: 8 February 2017
RTCA Paper No. 039-17/SC235-013
paragraph was simplified to the following: Test articles employed in the following tests must be
company-conformed and only modified as stated below for specific tests.
•
Test Procedures and Evaluation Criteria (Paragraph 2.4 and all sub paragraphs). It was requested
and agreed upon that all tests in this section include a list of “Reportable” items. This was
accomplished as each item was reviewed.
•
End Item Load Profile (Paragraph 2.2.3.2.3). There was general confusion regarding the intent of
this requirement as written in the current draft document. Several in the group pointed to the
existing DO-227 requirement requested that it be retained as written to avoid confusion. After
discussing, the group agreed to keep the requirement as in DO-227.
Final Review and Comment (FRAC) Process Review
At the completion of the document review, there were a few minor cleanup and formatting issues needed.
Otherwise, the committee was confident in the state of that the document. The committee agreed to allow
the working group to finalize the document and unanimously agreed to approve the document to begin the
Final Review and Comment (FRAC) process.
Karan Hofmann reviewed the FRAC process with the committee to ensure everyone understood how to
submit their comments. Per the schedule below, the FRAC process will begin on February 1, 2017. At that
time, each committee member of SC-235, SC-225, and SC-229 will receive a copy of DO-227A and a
comment spreadsheet as shown below. For each comment, the reviewer is asked to identify the section
(paragraph number), page, line number (shown in left margin of the document), item (e.g. paragraph, table,
figure), and proposed solution for each comment provided.
Of key importance is the proper categorization of the comment. These are selected by a “pull down” menu
and have the following choices: Non-Concur, High, Medium, Low, and Editorial. A Non-Concur rating
is considered a “show stopper” and such a rating implies that the reviewer cannot accept the
requirement/document wording at all. It was pointed out that a Non-Concur categorization from a
committee member is unusual and would indicate that that member’s comments and concerns were not
adequately addressed in the Plenary or Working Group process. High, Medium, and Low categorizations
means that the reviewer Concurs with the requirement/document wording, but has a comment with the
indicated level of priority. Finally, the editorial category are for items addressing spelling, grammar, or of
another non-substantive nature. The “Definitions” tab in the spreadsheet provides further definition and
detail for entry field.
Date: 8 February 2017
RTCA Paper No. 039-17/SC235-013
SC-235 Schedule Review
The top level project schedule was reviewed. Given the progress made to date, the team agreed that the
following key activities remain.
•
•
•
•
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Begin Final Review and Comments (FRAC)
FRAC Comments Due
Plenary #7 – FRAC Solution
Delivery of FRAC Resolved Document to RTCA
PMC Approval
1Feb17
3Mar17
21-23Mar17
19Apr17
22Jun17
The revised schedule is shown below.
Action Item Summary
There are no open action items.
Next Plenary
Plenary #7 has been scheduled for March 21-23, 2017 at RTCA Headquarters, 1150 18th St. NW,
Suite 910, Washington, D.C. 20036. A detailed agenda and WebEx meeting information will be
issued closer to this meeting date.
-SJeff Densmore
Secretary
CERTIFIED as a true and accurate summary of the meeting.
-SJohn Trela
Chairman