Aircraft Engine Monitoring via Phase Segmentation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current health monitoring methods for aircraft engines, particularly military engines, face challenges in standardizing operating conditions due to varying flight profiles, making it difficult to predict maintenance needs effectively.
Innovation Solution
A method that processes sequences of physical parameters from aircraft engines, separating and standardizing endogenous and exogenous parameters using regression models and phase signatures to identify stabilized flight phases, allowing for the determination of representative snapshots that characterize engine behavior regardless of environmental context.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Device complexity
If standardization methods using average operations are applied to military engine flight profiles, then the complexity of the monitoring system is reduced, but the reliability of monitoring under severe external conditions deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the flight profile into distinct phases (take-off, climb, combat, cruise, descent, landing) and creates specific signatures for each phase. This segmentation allows the system to handle the complexity of military flight profiles by breaking them down into manageable, characteristic segments rather than attempting to average them into a single profile.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent implements dynamic adaptation by allowing the system to learn and update phase signatures from actual flight data. The monitoring system dynamically adjusts to varying flight conditions by comparing real-time parameters against learned signatures, enabling reliable monitoring under diverse and severe external conditions without requiring a fixed, pre-defined profile.
2Adaptability or versatility
If the monitoring system attempts to account for all varieties of military operations, then the adaptability of the system is improved, but the device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by pre-defining characteristic phases of military flight operations (take-off, climb, combat, cruise, descent, landing) and their associated parameter signatures. This preliminary structuring allows the system to adapt to diverse operations by matching real-time data against these pre-established phase patterns, reducing the complexity of handling all possible flight scenarios from scratch.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent utilizes parameter changes by monitoring multiple engine parameters (temperature, pressure, flow rates, rotational speeds) simultaneously and comparing their combined signature against phase-specific patterns. This multi-parameter approach enables the system to adapt to various military operations by detecting characteristic parameter combinations for each flight phase without requiring complex individual analysis of each parameter.
Data Source
AI summary
The present invention relates to method for monitoring an engine (1) of an aircraft (2) operating in a given environment. The invention is characterized in that it comprises the implementation, via means for data processing (31), of the steps of: (a) receiving a sequence of n-tuples (x1-exec. . . xn-exec; yexec) of physical-parameter values relating to said aircraft (2) engine (1), including at least one endogenous parameter specific to the operation of the engine (1) and at least one exogenous parameter specific to said environment; (b) For each n-tuple (x1-exec. . . xn-exec, yexec) of the received sequence, calculating, according to a regression model, a standardized value (yexec-norm) of the endogenous parameter in relation to the exogenous parameters; (c) identifying at least one stabilized phase in said normalized sequence of n-tuples (x1-exec. . . xn-exec; yexec-norm) from a set of phase signatures; (d) for each stabilized phase, calculating the mean values of the physical parameters on the portion of the sequence of n-tuples (x1-exec. . . xn-exec; yexec) corresponding to the stabilized phase, in order to obtain an n-tuple (x1. . . xn; y) defining a recurrent point of said flight of the aircraft (2).