Academic literature on the topic 'Gas Turbine Engine Control'

Gas turbine engine performance improvement has been requested continuously for both military and commercial applications due t various reasons. One of the issues is to save fuel and/or to increase the engine life to meet the multi-mission and operation cost economics requirements. I order to satisfy the customers' requirements, the engine manufacturers invested a lot of money and time if the gas turbine performance improvement. The most straight forward and simple approach is to trade the excess remained surge margins for performance. NASA has demonstrated the feasibility of this concept in their F-15 Highly Integrated Digital Electronic Control and Performance Seeking Control programs. It offers not only obvious benefits if the overall system performance improvement but also cost effective operations such a fuel saving and extended component life. Those were carried out with traditional control approaches which have to face the modelling difficulties. ' Due to successful control implementations of fuzzy logic if various environment of uncertainties, a proportional plus integral z logic controller if proposed. The fuzzy logic control system simulation results prove that the fuzzy logic controller is appropriate for gas turbine engine control. Basic fuzzy logic control concept is used with new approaches to simplifying the fuzzy logic controller. I order to enhance the engine performance, fuzzy logic control concept is used to optimize the engine performance parameters. A time function linear control scheme is proposed to the engine to a new operation location System simulation results prove the new methodology. It has to be understood that the engine model used if this research is not representative of a gas turbine, but it `is appropriate for the fuzzy logic control design analysis and simulation.

Typical modem fighter aircraft use two-spool, low by-pass ratio, turbojet engines to provide the thrust needed to carry out the combat manoeuvres required by present-day air warfare tactics. The dynamic characteristics of such aircraft engines are complex and non-linear. The need for fast, accurate control of the engine throughout the flight envelope is of paramount importance and this research was concerned with the study of such problems and subsequent design of an optimal linear control which would improve the engine's dynamic response and provide the required correspondence between the output from the engine and the values commanded by a pilot. A detailed mathematical model was derived which, in accuracy and complexity of representation, was a large improvement upon existing analytical models, which assume linear operation over a very small region of the state space, and which was simpler than the large non-analytic representations, which are based on matching operational data. The non-linear model used in this work was based upon information obtained from DYNGEN, a computer program which is used to calculate the steady-state and transient responses of turbojet and turbofan engines. It is a model of fifth order which, it is shown, correctly models the qualitative behaviour of a representative jet engine. A number of operating points were selected to define the boundaries used for the flight envelope. For each point a performance investigation was carried out and a related linear model was established. By posing the problem of engine control as a linear quadratic problem, in which the constraint was the state equation of the linear model, control laws appropriate for each operating point were obtained. A single control was effective with the linear model at every point. The same control laws were then applied to the non-linear mathematical model adjusted for each operating point, and the resulting responses were carefully studied to determine if one single control law could be used with all operating points. Such a law was established. This led, naturally, to the determination of an optimal linear tracking control law, and a further investigation to determine whether there existed an optimal non-linear control law for the non-linear model. In the work presented in this dissertation these points are fully discussed and the reasons for choosing to find an optimal linear control law for the non-linear model by solving the related two-point, boundary value problem using the method of quasilinearisation are presented. A comparison of the effectiveness of the respective optimal control laws, based upon digital simulation, is made before suggestions and recommendations for further work are presented.

Gas turbine engine performance improvement has been requested continuously for both military and commercial applications due t various reasons. One of the issues is to save fuel and/or to increase the engine life to meet the multi-mission and operation cost economics requirements. I order to satisfy the customers' requirements, the engine manufacturers invested a lot of money and time if the gas turbine performance improvement. The most straight forward and simple approach is to trade the excess remained surge margins for performance. NASA has demonstrated the feasibility of this concept in their F-15 Highly Integrated Digital Electronic Control and Performance Seeking Control programs. It offers not only obvious benefits if the overall system performance improvement but also cost effective operations such a fuel saving and extended component life. Those were carried out with traditional control approaches which have to face the modelling difficulties. ' Due to successful control implementations of fuzzy logic if various environment of uncertainties, a proportional plus integral z logic controller if proposed. The fuzzy logic control system simulation results prove that the fuzzy logic controller is appropriate for gas turbine engine control. Basic fuzzy logic control concept is used with new approaches to simplifying the fuzzy logic controller. I order to enhance the engine performance, fuzzy logic control concept is used to optimize the engine performance parameters. A time function linear control scheme is proposed to the engine to a new operation location System simulation results prove the new methodology. It has to be understood that the engine model used if this research is not representative of a gas turbine, but it `is appropriate for the fuzzy logic control design analysis and simulation.

A recent development in the design of control system for a jet engine is to use a suitable, fast and accurate model running on board. Development of linear models is particularly important as most engine control designs are based on linear control theory. Engine control performance can be significantly improved by increasing the accuracy of the developed model. Current state-of-the-art is to use piecewise linear models at selected equilibrium conditions for the development of set point controllers, followed by scheduling of resulting controller gains as a function of one or more of the system states. However, arriving at an effective gain scheduler that can accommodate fast transients covering a wide range of operating points can become quite complex and involved, thus resulting in a sacrifice on controller performance for its simplicity. This thesis presents a methodology for developing a control oriented analytical linear model of a jet engine at both equilibrium and off-equilibrium conditions. This scheme requires a nonlinear engine model to run onboard in real time. The off-equilibrium analytical linear model provides improved accuracy and flexibility over the commonly used piecewise linear models developed using numerical perturbations. Linear coefficients are obtained by evaluating, at current conditions, analytical expressions which result from differentiation of simplified nonlinear expressions. Residualization of the fast dynamics states are utilized since the fast dynamics are typically outside of the primary control bandwidth. Analytical expressions based on the physics of the aerothermodynamic processes of a gas turbine engine facilitate a systematic approach to the analysis and synthesis of model based controllers. In addition, the use of analytical expressions reduces the computational effort, enabling linearization in real time at both equilibrium and off-equilibrium conditions for a more accurate capture of system dynamics during aggressive transient maneuvers. The methodology is formulated and applied to a separate flow twin-spool turbofan engine model in the Numerical Propulsion System Simulation (NPSS) platform. The fidelity of linear model is examined by validating against a detailed nonlinear engine model using time domain response, the normalized additive uncertainty and the nu-gap metric. The effects of each simplifying assumptions, which are crucial to the linear model development, on the fidelity of the linear model are analyzed in detail. A case study is performed to investigate the case when the current state (including both slow and fast states) of the system is not readily available from the nonlinear simulation model. Also, a simple model based control is used to illustrate benefits of using the proposed modeling approach.

Hydrogen-powered engines have been gaining increasing interest due to the global concerns of the effects of hydrocarbon combustion on climate change. Gas turbines are suitable for operation on hydrogen fuel. This thesis reports the results of investigations of the special requirements of the fuel controller for a hydrogen gas turbine. In this investigation, a digital fuel controller for a hydrogen-fueled modified Pratt and Whitney PT6A-20 turboprop engine was successfully designed and implemented. Included in the design are safety measures to protect the operating personnel and the engine. A redundant fuel control is part of the final design to provide a second method of managing the engine should there be a malfunction in any part of the primary controller. <p> Parallel to this study, an investigation of the existing hydrogen combustor design was performed to analyze the upper stability limits that were restricting the operability of the engine. The upstream propagation of the flame into the premixer, more commonly known as a flashback, routinely occurred at 150 shaft horsepower during engine testing. The procedures for protecting the engine from a flashback were automated within the fuel controller, significantly reducing the response time from the previous (manual) method. Additionally, protection measures were added to ensure the inter-turbine temperature of the engine did not exceed published limits. Automatic engine starting and shutdown procedures were also added to the control logic, minimizing the effort needed by the operator. The tested performance of the engine with each of the control functions demonstrated the capability of the controller. <p> Methods to generate an engine-specific fuel control map were also studied. The control map would not only takes into account the operability limits of the engine, but also the stability limits of the premixing devices. Such a map is integral in the complete design of the engine fuel controller.<br>Master of Science