Digital Twin in Civil Aviation Aircraft Smart Maintenance Management

Digital twin technology provides a promising approach for integrating the diverse physical and information resources involved in civil aircraft maintenance. However, existing studies often address individual technologies or isolated maintenance applications, while the systematic integration of digital twins and complementary digital technologies within a digital hangar remains insufficiently clarified. This study develops a practice-informed framework for digital-twin-enabled smart aircraft maintenance through a structured synthesis of relevant technologies and an illustrative analysis of the China Eastern Airlines Digital Hangar project. The framework organizes the smart maintenance system into interconnected functions for data perception, digital representation and data management, analytical decision support, and visualization and simulation. The industrial case illustrates how these functions can be mapped to core maintenance-management domains, including personnel, tools, aircraft materials, maintenance tasks, and safety. The analysis also clarifies the distinction between a digital-twin-enabled maintenance system and a conventional maintenance information platform with three-dimensional visualization. To support subsequent empirical assessment, operational efficiency, traceability, decision quality, system reliability, and economic performance are proposed as key evaluation dimensions. The framework provides a structured reference for the design, assessment, and further development of digital hangars in civil aviation maintenance.