What flap design does the A380 use? Is it Fowler flaps, slotted flaps or a combination?

Question

I have looked at maintenance manuals, the Airbus website, and Wikipedia but still could not find a definite answer as to what trailing edge flaps the Airbus A380 uses.

Answer 1

Airbus calls them single slotted, tracked high lift flaps in this presentation:

When watching the flap extension in this YouTube video you can see that the flaps extend backwards and downwards at the same time, which would make them single slotted Fowler flaps:

Answer 2

Adding to @Bianfable's answer, I'd like to address the terminology/usage.

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When referring to flaps on jetliners, single-slotted means single-slotted Fowler.

The way a slot is created is in one of two ways:

1. Fixed pivot point below the flap line (first image below)

   • Slow airplanes
   • Flaperons on jetliners

2. Flaps extend backward and down (Fowler)

   • Main flaps on jetliners (e.g. A380)

Side note: A "compromise" between the two is using a deep pivot which creates large Fowler motion, and to then droop the spoilers to manage the big gap, as used by the A350 (see related Q&A).

For the first "simple" type:

[...] the lower cove panel has to be rotated upward with a slave linkage, so the simple flap turns out to be not quite that simple. The simple slotted flap is not used on any modern airliner as a main flap concept, but the concept is used for flaperons.^[ref] [emphasis added]

The blue circle I added below shows that cove panel; it can be seen on the Boeing 777's flaperons (second image below).

Source: ref

Arrow showing the aforementioned door, also note the fixed pivot point. Source: Bill Abbott, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

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Reference:

• Peter, K. C. "High-Lift systems on commercial subsonic airliners." NASA CR-4746, Sept (1996).

Further reading on developing the A380 high-lift system:

• Neittaanmäki, P., et al. "AERODYNAMIC DESIGN OF AIRBUS HIGH-LIFT WINGS IN A MULTIDISCIPLINARY ENVIRONMENT." (2004).