Engineering Papers⌕ Search

SEARCH · Engineering Papers

Results for “Engineering management”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

Quote a phrase for an exact phrase match. Source license links do not imply unrestricted reuse.

At least 541 records · Page 30
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS2004

[The Engineering and Technical Services Directorate at the Glenn Research Center]

My name is James Moon and I am a senior at Tennessee State University where my major is Aeronautical and Industrial Technology with a concentration in industrial electronics. I am currently serving my internship in the Engineering and Technical Services Directorate at the Glenn Research Center (GRC). The Engineering and Technical Service Directorate provides the services and infrastructure for the Glenn Research Center to take research concepts to reality. They provide a full range of integrated services including engineering, advanced prototyping and testing, facility management, and information technology for NASA, industry, and academia. Engineering and Technical Services contains the core knowledge in Information Technology (IT). This includes data systems and analysis, inter and intranet based systems design and data security. Including the design and development of embedded real-time s o h a r e applications for flight and supporting ground systems, Engineering and Technical Services provide a wide range of IT services and products specific to the Glenn Research Center research and engineering community. In the 7000 Directorate I work directly in the 7611 organization. This organization is known as the Aviation Environments Technical Branch. My mentor is Vincent Satterwhite who is also the Branch Chief of the Aviation Environments Technical Branch. In this branch, I serve as the Assistant program manager of the Engineering Technology Program. The Engineering Technology Program (ETP) is one of three components of the High School L.E.R.C.I.P. This is an Agency-sponsored, eight-week research-based apprenticeship program designed to attract traditionally underrepresented high school students that demonstrate an aptitude for and interest in mathematics, science, engineering, and technology.

Moon, James↗
NASA NTRS2010

An Integrated Architecture for On-Board Aircraft Engine Performance Trend Monitoring and Gas Path Fault Diagnostics

Aircraft engine performance trend monitoring and gas path fault diagnostics are closely related technologies that assist operators in managing the health of their gas turbine engine assets. Trend monitoring is the process of monitoring the gradual performance change that an aircraft engine will naturally incur over time due to turbomachinery deterioration, while gas path diagnostics is the process of detecting and isolating the occurrence of any faults impacting engine flow-path performance. Today, performance trend monitoring and gas path fault diagnostic functions are performed by a combination of on-board and off-board strategies. On-board engine control computers contain logic that monitors for anomalous engine operation in real-time. Off-board ground stations are used to conduct fleet-wide engine trend monitoring and fault diagnostics based on data collected from each engine each flight. Continuing advances in avionics are enabling the migration of portions of the ground-based functionality on-board, giving rise to more sophisticated on-board engine health management capabilities. This paper reviews the conventional engine performance trend monitoring and gas path fault diagnostic architecture commonly applied today, and presents a proposed enhanced on-board architecture for future applications. The enhanced architecture gains real-time access to an expanded quantity of engine parameters, and provides advanced on-board model-based estimation capabilities. The benefits of the enhanced architecture include the real-time continuous monitoring of engine health, the early diagnosis of fault conditions, and the estimation of unmeasured engine performance parameters. A future vision to advance the enhanced architecture is also presented and discussed

Simon, Donald L.↗
NASA NTRS2005

Real-Time Simulation for Verification and Validation of Diagnostic and Prognostic Algorithms

To verify that a health management system (HMS) performs as expected, a virtual system simulation capability, including interaction with the associated platform or vehicle, very likely will need to be developed. The rationale for developing this capability is discussed and includes the limited capability to seed faults into the actual target system due to the risk of potential damage to high value hardware. The capability envisioned would accurately reproduce the propagation of a fault or failure as observed by sensors located at strategic locations on and around the target system and would also accurately reproduce the control system and vehicle response. In this way, HMS operation can be exercised over a broad range of conditions to verify that it meets requirements for accurate, timely response to actual faults with adequate margin against false and missed detections. An overview is also presented of a real-time rocket propulsion health management system laboratory which is available for future rocket engine programs. The health management elements and approaches of this lab are directly applicable for future space systems. In this paper the various components are discussed and the general fault detection, diagnosis, isolation and the response (FDIR) concept is presented. Additionally, the complexities of V&V (Verification and Validation) for advanced algorithms and the simulation capabilities required to meet the changing state-of-the-art in HMS are discussed.

Aguilar, Robet↗
NASA NTRS2019

Improvements to the Copernicus Trajectory Design and Optimization System for Complex Space Trajectories

The purpose of this assessment was to develop updates and new features for the NASA Copernicus Spacecraft Trajectory Design and Optimization analysis tool (version 5.0) for application to NASA programs and projects. These updates will significantly improve the ability to design and optimize complex trajectories over multiple trajectory phases; will allow the use of unique vehicle-specific guidance, control, and trajectory strategies and constraints; and the creation of an almost unlimited number of unique user-defined capabilities. The primary stakeholders for this assessment are the trajectory design and optimization analysts and engineers, and the chief engineers and project managers for existing programs, projects, and/or tasks that involve impulsive, finite burn, and/or continuous thrust trajectories (e.g., Sun, planet, comet, asteroid, halo orbit, Lagrange point, and distant retrograde orbit). The breadth of application spans the preliminary engineering and mission design concepts and optimization, to the development of candidate reference missions and integrated mission design for vehicle system design and operation, to the design and development of flight trajectories and associated propulsive maneuvers for real-time operations.

Murri, Daniel G.↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Developing Deep Learning Models for System Remaining Useful Life Predictions: Application to Aircraft Engines

Prognostics and health management (PHM) is an important part of ensuring reliable operations of complex safety- critical systems. System-level remaining useful life (RUL) estimation is a much more complex problem than making estimations at the component level, and system-level RUL methodologies remain sparse in the literature. Model-based approaches have traditionally worked in the past for components such as capacitors, MOSFETs, batteries, or hard-drives (to name a few examples), but developing high fidelity dynamics models of cyber physical systems that can be used to study the effects of multiple degrading components in the system remains a challenging task. Some initial work on model-based System RUL predictions was demonstrated in Khorasgani, et al [1], but, to generalize the system-level prognostics problem, we have to resort to pure data driven and hybrid approaches. In this work, we propose an end-to-end data- driven framework for developing deep learning models to predict remaining useful life of cyber physical systems operating under unknown faulty conditions. The raw data is organized with a data schema that improves the model development process and down stream data analysis tasks. Due to the unknown faulty conditions, the raw sensor data is transformed into signals that expose the underlying degradation processes, which are then used for model development. Bayesian Optimization is used to tune the model parameters prior to training and validation. We show that this approach results in accurate predictions within 3 cycles to end of life (EOL). We demonstrate the effectiveness of our approach by applying it to the N-CMAPSS turbofan engine dataset recently released by NASA, which includes high fidelity degradation modeling, real world operating conditions, and a large set of fault operating modes.

Prognostics↗
NASA NTRS2016

The Value of Successful MBSE Adoption

The value of successful adoption of Model Based System Engineering (MBSE) practices is hard to quantify. Most engineers and project managers look at the success in terms of cost. But there are other ways to quantify the value of MBSE and the steps necessary to achieve adoption. The Glenn Research Center (GRC) has been doing Model-Based Engineering (design, structural, etc.) for years, but the system engineering side has not. Since 2010, GRC has been moving from documents centric to MBSE/SysML. Project adoption of MBSE has been slow, but is steadily increasing in both MBSE usage and complexity of generated products. Sharing of knowledge of lessons learned in the implementation of MBSE/SysML is key for others who want to be successful. Along with GRC's implementation, NASA is working hard to increase the successful implementation of MBSE across all the other centers by developing guidelines, templates and libraries for projects to utilize. This presentation will provide insight into recent GRC and NASA adoption efforts, lessons learned and best practices.

MBSE↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Optimizing Urban Air Mobility Research Through Bi-Directional Integration Processes for Effective Verification and Validation

Urban Air Mobility (UAM), a subset of Advanced Air Mobility (AAM), aims to revolutionize metropolitan transportation. This paper explores an engineering process framework within National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)’s Air Mobility Pathfinders (AMP) project, which is focused on the safe scaling and seamless integration of UAM operations within the National Airspace System (NAS). Progressing through three phases — Initial, Midterm, and Mature — the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)’s UAM Concept of Operations (ConOps) describes a proposed path for the evolution of UAM operations, presenting multifaceted challenges in technology, regulation, and stakeholder engagement. With this ConOps as a basis, the AMP project is executing research, development, test, and evaluation activities aimed at delivering validated reference architectures for the Midterm phase. This paper illuminates the pivotal role of the systems engineering process in managing these technical efforts. Robust verification and validation methods, along with systematic bi-directional integration process, enhance the ability to conduct research into the design and evolution of safe, efficient, and reliable UAM systems. In this paper a systematic framework will be presented and shown to facilitate interactions between UAM stakeholders and to effectively manage the complex architecture of UAM operations in the NAS.

National Airspace System↗
NASA NTRS1978

Space Shuttle Orbiter audio subsystem

The selection of the audio multiplex control configuration for the Space Shuttle Orbiter audio subsystem is discussed and special attention is given to the evaluation criteria of cost, weight and complexity. The specifications and design of the subsystem are described and detail is given to configurations of the audio terminal and audio central control unit (ATU, ACCU). The audio input from the ACCU, at a signal level of -12.2 to 14.8 dBV, nominal range, at 1 kHz, was found to have balanced source impedance and a balanced local impedance of 6000 + or - 600 ohms at 1 kHz, dc isolated. The Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center (JSC) electroacoustic test laboratory, an audio engineering facility consisting of a collection of acoustic test chambers, analyzed problems of speaker and headset performance, multiplexed control data coupled with audio channels, and the Orbiter cabin acoustic effects on the operational performance of voice communications. This system allows technical management and project engineering to address key constraining issues, such as identifying design deficiencies of the headset interface unit and the assessment of the Orbiter cabin performance of voice communications, which affect the subsystem development.

Stewart, C. H.↗
NASA NTRS2003

Integration and Test of Shuttle Small Payloads

Recommended approaches for space shuttle small payload integration and test (I&T) are presented. The paper is intended for consideration by developers of shuttle small payloads, including I&T managers, project managers, and system engineers. Examples and lessons learned are presented based on the extensive history of NASA's Hitchhiker project. All aspects of I&T are presented, including: (1) I&T team responsibilities, coordination, and communication; (2) Flight hardware handling practices; (3) Documentation and configuration management; (4) I&T considerations for payload development; (5) I&T at the development facility; (6) Prelaunch operations, transfer, orbiter integration and interface testing; (7) Postflight operations. This paper is of special interest to those payload projects that have small budgets and few resources: that is, the truly faster, cheaper, better projects. All shuttle small payload developers are strongly encouraged to apply these guidelines during I&T planning and ground operations to take full advantage of today's limited resources and to help ensure mission success.

Wright, Michael R.↗
NASA NTRS2001

Integration and Test for Small Shuttle Payloads

Recommended approaches for shuttle small payload integration and test (I&T) are presented. The paper is intended for consideration by developers of small shuttle payloads, including I&T managers, project managers, and system engineers. Examples and lessons learned are presented based on the extensive history of the NASA's Hitchhiker project. All aspects of I&T are presented, including: (1) I&T team responsibilities, coordination, and communication; (2) Flight hardware handling practices; (3) Documentation and configuration management; (4) I&T considerations for payload development; (5) I&T at the development facility; (6) Prelaunch operations, transfer, orbiter integration, and interface testing; and (7) Postflight operations. This paper is of special interest to those payload projects which have small budgets and few resources: That is, the truly 'faster, cheaper, better' projects. All shuttle small payload developers are strongly encouraged to apply these guidelines during I&T planning and ground operations to take full advantage of today's limited resources and to help ensure mission success.

Wright, Michael R.↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Development and Implementation of a Small Satellite Systems Engineering Webinar Series: A Collaboration Between United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs and National Aeronautics and Space Administration

The United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) in collaboration with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) established a webinar series on NASA systems engineering standards and practices for the purpose of sharing knowledge in this area through UNOOSA’s “Access to Space for All” which provides free and accessible educational content. Through NASA’s Small Spacecraft Systems Virtual Institute (S3VI), the four-part series was designed to cover basic systems engineering and project management skills that are fundamental for planning, developing, and implementing an experiment or a space project, and that serve as critical knowledge for those engaged in space activities, whether as a designer, builder, or manager of space infrastructure and services. This first series of webinars was convened over the course of November 2023 through February 2024. The webinar series was segmented into four one and a half hour webinars which covered topics related to the Fundamentals of Systems Engineering, Requirements and Systems Engineering, System Assembly, Integration and Test, and Spacecraft Handling, as well as an Introduction to the Small Spacecraft Systems Virtual Institute (S3VI). The agendas for the first three webinars focused on addressing a number of questions relevant to a particular topic. Examples of these questions include: What is systems engineering and what does a systems engineer do? Why does NASA use systems engineering? How do you define requirements for a small spacecraft mission? Why are requirements important to space missions? How are trade studies used to determine parts selection and why are they important? The final webinar of the first series provided interactive discussions and demonstrations of the S3VI tools; shared information on additional webinar opportunities offered by the S3VI; and reviewed databases curated by the S3VI that include the Small Satellite Reliability Initiative (SSRI) Knowledge Base Tool, Mission Design Tools, Small Spacecraft Information Search, and the State-of-the-Art (SoA) Small Spacecraft Report. Future webinar series will be conducted with topics are to be determined. The presenter will discuss details related to the first webinar series and future plans for additional series.

systems engineering↗
NASA NTRS2010

NASA Spacecraft Fault Management Workshop Results

Fault Management is a critical aspect of deep-space missions. For the purposes of this paper, fault management is defined as the ability of a system to detect, isolate, and mitigate events that impact, or have the potential to impact, nominal mission operations. The fault management capabilities are commonly distributed across flight and ground subsystems, impacting hardware, software, and mission operations designs. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Discovery & New Frontiers (D&NF) Program Office at Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) recently studied cost overruns and schedule delays for 5 missions. The goal was to identify the underlying causes for the overruns and delays, and to develop practical mitigations to assist the D&NF projects in identifying potential risks and controlling the associated impacts to proposed mission costs and schedules. The study found that 4 out of the 5 missions studied had significant overruns due to underestimating the complexity and support requirements for fault management. As a result of this and other recent experiences, the NASA Science Mission Directorate (SMD) Planetary Science Division (PSD) commissioned a workshop to bring together invited participants across government, industry, academia to assess the state of the art in fault management practice and research, identify current and potential issues, and make recommendations for addressing these issues. The workshop was held in New Orleans in April of 2008. The workshop concluded that fault management is not being limited by technology, but rather by a lack of emphasis and discipline in both the engineering and programmatic dimensions. Some of the areas cited in the findings include different, conflicting, and changing institutional goals and risk postures; unclear ownership of end-to-end fault management engineering; inadequate understanding of the impact of mission-level requirements on fault management complexity; and practices, processes, and tools that have not kept pace with the increasing complexity of mission requirements and spacecraft systems. This paper summarizes the findings and recommendations from that workshop, as well as opportunities identified for future investment in tools, processes, and products to facilitate the development of space flight fault management capabilities.

Newhouse, Marilyn↗
NASA NTRS2010

Results from the NASA Spacecraft Fault Management Workshop: Cost Drivers for Deep Space Missions

Fault Management, the detection of and response to in-flight anomalies, is a critical aspect of deep-space missions. Fault management capabilities are commonly distributed across flight and ground subsystems, impacting hardware, software, and mission operations designs. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Discovery & New Frontiers (D&NF) Program Office at Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) recently studied cost overruns and schedule delays for five missions. The goal was to identify the underlying causes for the overruns and delays, and to develop practical mitigations to assist the D&NF projects in identifying potential risks and controlling the associated impacts to proposed mission costs and schedules. The study found that four out of the five missions studied had significant overruns due to underestimating the complexity and support requirements for fault management. As a result of this and other recent experiences, the NASA Science Mission Directorate (SMD) Planetary Science Division (PSD) commissioned a workshop to bring together invited participants across government, industry, and academia to assess the state of the art in fault management practice and research, identify current and potential issues, and make recommendations for addressing these issues. The workshop was held in New Orleans in April of 2008. The workshop concluded that fault management is not being limited by technology, but rather by a lack of emphasis and discipline in both the engineering and programmatic dimensions. Some of the areas cited in the findings include different, conflicting, and changing institutional goals and risk postures; unclear ownership of end-to-end fault management engineering; inadequate understanding of the impact of mission-level requirements on fault management complexity; and practices, processes, and tools that have not kept pace with the increasing complexity of mission requirements and spacecraft systems. This paper summarizes the findings and recommendations from that workshop, particularly as fault management development issues affect operations and the development of operations capabilities.

Newhouse, Marilyn E.↗
NASA NTRS2005

SQL-RAMS

SQL-RAMS (where "SQL" signifies Structured Query Language and "RAMS" signifies Rocketdyne Automated Management System) is a successor to the legacy version of RAMS a computer program used to manage all work, nonconformance, corrective action, and configuration management on rocket engines and ground support equipment at Stennis Space Center. The legacy version resided in the FileMaker Pro software system and was constructed in modules that could act as stand-alone programs. There was little or no integration among modules. Because of limitations on file-management capabilities in FileMaker Pro, and because of difficulty of integration of FileMaker Pro with other software systems for exchange of data using such industry standards as SQL, the legacy version of RAMS proved to be limited, and working to circumvent its limitations too time-consuming. In contrast, SQL-RAMS is an integrated SQL-server-based program that supports all data-exchange software industry standards. Whereas in the legacy version, it was necessary to access individual modules to gain insight to a particular work-status documents, SQL-RAMS provides access through a single-screen presentation of core modules. In addition, SQL-RAMS enable rapid and efficient filtering of displayed statuses by predefined categories and test numbers. SQL-RAMS is rich in functionality and encompasses significant improvements over the legacy system. It provides users the ability to perform many tasks which in the past required administrator intervention. Additionally many of the design limitations have been corrected allowing for a robust application that is user centric.

Alfaro, Victor O.↗
NASA NTRS2005

SQL-RAMS

SQL-RAMS (where "SQL" signifies Structured Query Language and "RAMS" signifies Rocketdyne Automated Management System) is a successor to the legacy version of RAMS -- a computer program used to manage all work, nonconformance, corrective action, and configuration management on rocket engines and ground support equipment at Stennis Space Center. The legacy version resided in the File-Maker Pro software system and was constructed in modules that could act as standalone programs. There was little or no integration among modules. Because of limitations on file-management capabilities in FileMaker Pro, and because of difficulty of integration of FileMaker Pro with other software systems for exchange of data using such industry standards as SQL, the legacy version of RAMS proved to be limited, and working to circumvent its limitations too time-consuming. In contrast, SQL-RAMS is an integrated SQL-server-based program that supports all data-exchange software industry standards. Whereas in the legacy version, it was necessary to access individual modules to gain insight into a particular workstatus document, SQL-RAMS provides access through a single-screen presentation of core modules. In addition, SQL-RAMS enables rapid and efficient filtering of displayed statuses by predefined categories and test numbers. SQL-RAMS is rich in functionality and encompasses significant improvements over the legacy system. It provides users the ability to perform many tasks, which in the past required administrator intervention. Additionally, many of the design limitations have been corrected, allowing for a robust application that is user centric.

Alfaro, Victor O.↗
NASA NTRS1983

Progress toward determining the potential of ODS alloys for gas turbine applications

The Materials for Advanced Turbine Engine (MATE) Program managed by the NASA Lewis Research Center is supporting two projects to evaluate the potential of oxide dispersion strengthened (ODS) alloys for aircraft gas turbine applications. One project involves the evaluation of Incoloy (TM) MA-956 for application as a combustor liner material. An assessment of advanced engine potential will be conducted by means of a test in a P&WA 2037 turbofan engine. The other project involves the evaluation of Inconel (TM) MA 6000 for application as a high pressure turbine blade material and includes a test in a Garrett TFE 731 turbofan engine. Both projects are progressing toward these engine tests in 1984.

Dreshfield, R. L.↗
NASA NTRS2005

The Status of Lunar Simulants: Conclusions and Recommendations from the 2005 Lunar Regolith Simulant Materials Workshop

No coordinated program currently exists in the U.S.A to define reference materials to be used as analogs of lunar materials. While such efforts have existed at different times in the past (Apollo Landing Module and Lunar Rover programs and NASA's Space Initiative in the early 1990's), the need for mineral materials chosen to simulate the characteristics of lunar regoliths is a pressing issue that must be addressed today through the collaboration of scientists, engineers and program managers. The 2005 Lunar Regolith Materials Workshop was held at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, AL on January 24-26,2005 to launch a focused effort of defining the requirements of lunar >simulant materials and make specific recommendations to NASA Headquarters for their production. Nearly 100 scientists and engineers worked during 3 days to accomplish these goals. Their conclusions and recommendations will be presented.

Sibille, L.↗