Infrared Detector-Cooler Predictive Maintenance by Cool-Down Drift
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current detector-coolers in optronic systems, such as thermal cameras, are fragile, heterogeneous, and expensive, with limited maintenance capabilities that result in downtime and high maintenance costs due to unpredictable failures, necessitating a solution for predictive maintenance to anticipate malfunctions and optimize operational availability.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a predictive maintenance system that monitors the drift of the cold setting time (TMF) to anticipate potential failures by statistical processing of cumulative data, allowing each detector-cooler to build its own behavior model and reducing memory requirements through cumulative data storage, enabling self-adaptive and energy-efficient operation.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If current maintenance methods are used (noting failure when it occurs), then maintenance costs are high and downtime occurs, but the system is simple to operate
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary actions by continuously monitoring the cold setting time and detecting drifts before failure occurs. The maintenance system analyzes trends in cooling performance and predicts potential failures, allowing preventive maintenance to be scheduled before actual breakdown, thereby improving reliability without requiring complex real-time intervention systems
Solution Approach 2:
The detector-cooler system performs self-diagnosis by monitoring its own cold setting time parameters. The system automatically detects drifts in cooling performance and generates maintenance alerts without requiring external monitoring equipment, improving reliability while keeping the maintenance system relatively simple
2Measurement precision
If detailed temperature measurements and TMFs are stored for analysis, then predictive accuracy is improved, but memory space is insufficient
Solution Approach 1:
The system extracts only the essential information needed for prediction - the cold setting time values and their drift patterns - while discarding redundant detailed temperature measurements. By focusing on the key parameter (TMF drift) rather than storing all raw temperature data, the system achieves adequate predictive accuracy with minimal memory consumption
Solution Approach 2:
The system transforms detailed temperature measurement data into a simplified parameter representation - the cold setting time drift. By changing the data representation from raw temperature values to derived TMF parameters, the system maintains predictive capability while dramatically reducing the memory space required for data storage
3Reliability
If the cold machine is operated continuously, then operational availability is improved, but the detector-cooler becomes more fragile and prone to failure
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary detection of fatigue signs by monitoring cold setting time drift during operation. By detecting early signs of deterioration through TMF analysis, the system can schedule preventive maintenance before critical failure occurs, allowing the detector-cooler to operate at high availability while extending its effective lifespan through timely interventions
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This approach allows for proactive maintenance, improved operational performance, reduced energy consumption, and increased autonomy by predicting the number of starts before a threshold value is exceeded, thereby enhancing the operational availability of the detector-cooler with minimal memory usage.
Implementation Method 1
a cold machine 3 which uses helium for example and supplies the cryostat 2 the cold necessary to bring (in general to lower) its temperature from an ambient temperature to the operating temperature
Implementation Method 2
A servo device 4 of this cold machine according to the temperature Td of the detector supplied by a sensor 8
Data Source
AI summary
The invention relates to an optronic system provided with: a detector/cooler that comprises i) a refrigerating machine (3), ii) a cryostat (2), iii) an infrared detector (1) placed in the cryostat and iv) a sensor (8) for measuring the temperature TD of the detector; and a processing card (7) that includes means (4) for controlling the refrigerating machine as a function of the temperature TD. The system includes a sensor (9) for measuring the internal temperature Ts of the system, and the processing card (7) includes means (5) for calculating: the cool-down time CDT from the temperatures TD and Ts witheach "stop-start" cycle of the detector/cooler, a change in drift of the cool-down time CDT as a function of the number of "stop-start" cycles of the detector/cooler, and a number of "stop-start" cycles of the detector/cooler before breakdown as a function of said change in drift of the CDT. The invention also includes storage means (10) for storing the data used in the above-mentioned calculations, said data being cumulative data and not measurements of temperatures TD and Ts or the CDTs, so as to limit the size of the storage means.