ITC/USA 2010 Conference Proceedings / The Forty-Sixth Annual International Telemetering Conference and Technical Exhibition / October 25-28, 2010 / Town and Country Resort & Convention Center, San Diego, California / Accurate temperature measurement is an essential requirement in modern aircraft data acquisition systems. Both thermocouples and Platinum resistance temperature detectors (RTD) are used for this purpose with the latter being both more accurate and more repeatable. To ensure that only the sensor limits the accuracy of a temperature measurement, end-to-end system accuracy forward of the sensor, should be significantly greater than that of the sensor itself. This paper describes a new digital signal processing (DSP) based system for providing precision RTD based temperature measurements with laboratory accuracy in an aviation environment. Advantages of the new system include, true 3-wire RTD measurement, linear temperature output, on-board ultra-precision resistance standards and transparent dynamic calibration.

ITC/USA 2012 Conference Proceedings / The Forty-Eighth Annual International Telemetering Conference and Technical Exhibition / October 22-25, 2012 / Town and Country Resort & Convention Center, San Diego, California / The execution of experimental Flight Test Campaign (FTC) provides all information required for the aircraft operation and certification. Nowadays all information gathered during a FTC is provided by the Flight Test Instrumentation System (FTI) that is basically a measurement system. Typically for all FTI parameters, the estimation of the calibration coefficients that minimizes most of systematic errors and its associated uncertainty is carried out by a Static Calibration Process. To execute this task the Brazilian Institute of Research and Flight Test (Instituto de Pesquisa e Ensaios em Voo - IPEV) developed the Sistema de Automação do Laboratório de Ensaios em Voo (SALEV©) which is fully compliant with the calibration and uncertainty expression standards. For some parameters (i.e. Static Pressure) the sensor installation particularities (i.e. Pressure tapping) introduces low pass filtering characteristics into the measurement chain. In this case the measurement accuracy will be jeopardized when executing high-dynamic test points (i.e. Spin Tests). To overcome this issue the IPEV research and development group introduced a dynamic calibration process for flight test parameters that requires the knowledge of the actual Transfer Function (TF). The problem now is to simulate an impulsive input for the TF characterization which is too complex. To solve this issue a new calibration procedure was developed and evaluated for the determination of the FTI dynamic response. SALEV© was used to simulate a step input instead of an impulse. Then filtered and unfiltered data was properly compared for the determination of the TF. Preliminary test results show satisfactory performance.

Engine thermal and lubricant systems have only recently been a serious focus in engine design and in general remain under passive control. The introduction of active control has shown benefits in fuel consumption during the engine warm-up period, however there is a lack of rigorous calibration of these devices in conjunction with other engine systems. For these systems, benefits in fuel consumption (FC) are small and accurate measurement systems are required. Analysis of both FC and NOx emissions measurements processes was conducted and showed typical errors of 1% in FC from thermal expansion and 2% in NOx per g/kg change in absolute humidity. Correction factors were derived both empirically and from first principles to account for these disturbances. These improvements are applicable to the majority of experimental facilities and will be essential as future engine developments are expected to be achieved through small incremental steps. Using prototype hardware installed on a production 2.4L Diesel engine, methodologies for optimising the design, control and integration of these systems were demonstrated. Design of experiments (DoE) based approaches were used to model the engine behaviour under transient conditions. A subsequent optimisation procedure demonstrated a 3.2% reduction in FC during warm-up from 25°C under iso-NOx conditions. This complemented a 4% reduction from reduced oil pumping work using a variable displacement pump. A combination of classical DoE and transient testing allowed the dynamic behaviour of the engine to be captured empirically when prototype hardware is available. Furthermore, the enhancement of dynamic DoE approaches to include the thermal condition of the engine can produce models that, when combined with other available simulation packages, offer a tool for design optimisation when hardware is not available. These modelling approaches are applicable to a wide number of problems to evaluate design considerations at different stages of the engine development process. These allow the transient thermal behaviour of the engine to be captured, significantly enhancing conventional model based calibration approaches.

The work deals with processing of radio received signal strength in IEEE 802.15.4 which communicates in 2.4 GHz ISM band. The signal is processed by the three approximation methods. They are tested for their effectiveness for measuring in different radio environments. Furthermore, the work deals with calculation of the most efficient coefficients for distance calculating by radio transmission fucntions. It defines the issues of such solutions on practical examples. The work also deals with the experimental algorithm for implementing dynamic calibration of the coefficients. It describes the design, processing and verification of this system in practice.

The current research investigates the use of solid-embedded thermocouples for determining accurate transient temperature measurements within a solid medium, with emphasis on measurements intended for use in inverse heat conduction problems. Metal casting experiments have been conducted to collect internal mold temperatures to be used, through inverse conduction methods, to estimate the heat exchange between a casting and mold. Inverse conduction methods require accurate temperature measurements for valid boundary estimates. Therefore, various sources of thermocouple measurement uncertainty are examined and some suggestions for uncertainty reduction are presented. Thermocouple installation induced bias uncertainties in experimental temperature data are dynamically corrected through the development and implementation of an embedded thermocouple correction (ETC) transfer function. Comparisons of experimental data to dynamically adjusted data, as well as the inverse conduction estimates for heat flux from each data set, are presented and discussed.

This report describes a simple mechanical system developed for producing dynamic pressures of up to 50 kPa from zero-to-peak and over the frequency range 0-58 Hz. The system is constructed for dynamic calibration of pressure sensors and consists of an open tube, 30 cm in height, mounted vertically on the support plate. The support plate is connected to the vibration exciter which is driven by a piston, a connecting rod, disc and axle, and an electric motor. The pressure  sensor to be calibrated is mounted vertically at the bottom of the open tube so that the diaphragm of the sensor is in contact with the working liquid in the tube. When the system is started, the motion of the piston provides a sinusoidal movement to the open tube and calibration is achieved. The different parts of the system are designed using NX Siemens. MatLab is used to determine the results and graphs from the equations derived. The analysis shows that the displacement, velocity, and acceleration of the system are highly affected by the distance between the disc centre and the disc pin, and the rotational speed of the system. The length of the connecting rod does not affect the displacement and barely affects the velocity and acceleration of the system. The total force, torque, and power of the system is utilized to select the electric motor and the frequency inverter. / Denna rapport beskriver ett enkelt mekaniskt system som utvecklas för att producera dynamiska tryck upp till 50 kPa från noll-till-topp och över frekvensområdet 0-58 Hz. Systemet är konstruerat för dynamisk kalibrering av trycksensor och består av öppet rör 30 cm höjd monteras vertikalt på stödplattan. Stödplattan är ansluten till vibrationsexcite dvs, den yttre cylindern som drivs av en kolv, en vevstake, skiva och axel och en elmotor. Trycksensorn som skall kalibreras är monterad vertikalt vid botten av det öppna röret så att membranet hos sensorn är i kontakt med arbetsvätskan i röret. När systemet startas, ger rörelsen hos kolven som ger vibrationer till det öppna röret och kalibrering uppnås. De olika delarna av systemet är utformade med hjälp av NX Siemens. MatLab används för att bestämma resultaten och diagram härledda från ekvationerna. Analysen visar att den förskjutning, hastighet och acceleration av systemet är i hög grad påverkade av avståndet mellan skivans centrum och skivtappen, och rotationshastigheten hos systemet. Längdn av vevstaken påverkar inte försjutningen och påverkar knappt hastigheten och accelerationen hos systemet. Den totala kraften, vridmomentet och kraften i systemet användes för attvälja de andra komponenterna i systemet dvs, den elektriska motorn och frekvensomvandlaren.

Le rendement des turboréacteurs peut être amélioré en minimisant le jeu aube-carter, réduisant ainsi les pertes aérodynamiques. Ces jeux réduits occasionnent des risques de contact entre les aubes en rotation à grande vitesse et le carter moteur. Des matériaux sacrificiels, appelés matériaux abradables, sont alors déposés sur le carter pour limiter les endommagements induits par ces contact. Ces interactions font intervenir un grand nombre de mécanismes d’endommagement bénéfiques ou néfastes au bon fonctionnement du joint abradable et à la fiabilité du moteur. L’objectif de cette thèse est alors de comprendre, prédire et quantifier les différents endommagements et les efforts d’interaction associés pour des matériaux abradables obtenus à l’aide de paramètres procédés différents. Un dynamomètre triaxial a été développé afin de reproduire l’interaction locale entre l’extrémité de l’aube et le matériau abradable à très grande vitesse (50 – 300 m/s) lors de phases transitoires. La mesure d’efforts d’interaction lors de contacts de très courte durée (300 µs – 1 ms) nécessite une bande passante importante. Une méthode de correction basée sur l’analyse modale expérimentale a été mise en œuvre afin d’étendre la bande passante naturelle du dynamomètre et d’atténuer les couplages entre les différentes voies de mesure. Les mécanismes d’endommagements des abradables ont été étudiés à partir d’analyses post-mortem et corrélés aux efforts et vitesse d’interactions / The turbofan efficiency can be improved by minimizing the blade-casing gap, thus reducing the aerodynamic loss. The reduced gap conduces to contact risk between the high-speed rotating blades and the engine case. Sacrificial materials, called abradable materials, are deposited on the casing to limit the damage caused by these contacts. These interactions involve a lot of damage mechanisms, which can be adverse or beneficial to the proper performance of the abradable seal and to the reliability of the engine. The aim of this thesis is to understand, predict and quantify the different damages and the interaction forces associated for abradable materials obtained with different process parameters. A triaxial dynamometer was developed to reproduce the local high-speed interactions (50 – 300 m/s) between the blade tip and the abradable material during transitional phases. The interaction forces measurement during short-lived contacts (300 µs – 1 ms) requires a large bandwidth. A correction method based on experimental modal analysis was implemented to extend the natural bandwidth of the device and attenuate the crosstalk between the different measurement channels. The damage mechanisms of abradable materials were studied by post-mortem analysis and correlated to the interaction forces and velocity

This thesis deals with the dynamic properties of electric pressure transducers. These are properties that are reflected in the measurement of rapid, time-dependent processes. They could be described in two ways. Either by using amplitude and phase frequency response characteristics, or just one particular value. Natural frequency, cutoff frequency or time constant. These parameters indicate the extreme values for the use of measuring devices in the measurement of time-dependent processes. In this work will be described procedures for determining these parameters.