Page 16 - ASME SMASIS 2016 Program

Symposia

first-order optimal designs and are a basic and efficient method for either Biography
demonstrating design feasibility or refining design parameters. Although Dr. Eric J. Ruggiero received his Ph.D. from Virginia Tech in Mechanical
the design and integration of an SMA-based actuation system always Engineering in 2005 from the Center for Intelligent Material Systems and
requires application- and environment-specific engineering consider- Structures as a National Science Foundation graduate research fellow.
ations, common modeling tools can significantly reduce the investment Upon graduation, Dr. Ruggiero started his industrial research career at GE
required for actuation system development and provide valuable Global Research in Niskayuna, New York. From 2011 through 2014, he
engineering insight. served as Lab Manager for the Turbine Heat Transfer Technologies
Laboratory, where he led global research teams on the innovation, design,
test, and validation of advanced cooling schemes for gas turbines. At GE
Global Research, he led $25MM in R&D efforts in the field of gas turbines
Biography for GE. He was recently promoted in 2014 to Engineering Manager for the
Robert Wheeler is a Ph.D. candidate in the Aerospace Engineering Sustaining Commercial Thermal Systems Design team at GE Aviation in
Department of Texas A&M University studying under Dr. Dimitris Lagou- West Chester, Ohio. In this role, Dr. Ruggiero has responsibility for the hot
das. His work focuses on SMA actuator design and actuation fatigue gas path thermal design for GE’s commercial aviation fleet. He has
characterization and modeling. He received his B.S. in Aeronautics and published over 30 peer-reviewed manuscripts, issued over 15 patents, and
Astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 2012.
has received numerous awards from AIAA and ASME, including the 2013
AIAA Lawrence Sperry Award and an invitation to the 2013 NAE US
Frontiers of Engineering Forum. He is an Associate Fellow of the AIAA,
THE DIGITAL INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION IN AEROSPACE AND and a Lifetime Member of the ASME. You can follow him on Twitter
PROPULSION @EricRuggieroGE.

Eric Ruggiero
GE Aviation SYMPOSIUM 5
West Chester, OH
RETHINKING STRUCTURAL HEALTH MONITORING:
OUTSMARTING FATIGUE

Abstract
In the past 5 years, the intersection of high speed microprocessors, Ed Habtour
inexpensive data storage, and wireless communication technology has led Chief Scientist Office and Vehicle Technology
to a paradigm shift in how physical assets are operated and monitored. US Army Research Laboratory (ARL)
While the use of Prognostic Health Monitoring has been fairly common- Directorate, MD
place in military aircraft products over the past two decades or more, this
paradigm shift has now bridged and expanded into the commercial Abstract
aviation marketspace. Leveraging GE’s deep domain knowledge with Due to the unsustainable maintenance costs of high-value Army vehicles
data streams from engine assets is at the heart of the Digital Industrial that operate in complex environments, the US Army Research Laboratory
revolution.
(ARL) has been pursing fundamental research efforts to outsmart fatigue.
Digital Industrial is more than just data. It’s maximizing value for customer Over the past two years, ARL’s efforts required transitioning traditional
fleets in a number of ways, including: Asset Monitoring, to help reduce structural health monitoring (SHM) methodologies to Closed-Loop
unplanned maintenance and inspection burden; Fleet Optimization, to Adaptive State Awareness Systems. As a result, we recalibrated our efforts
ensure flight paths and fuel burn are as efficient as possible; and Improved to address three major technical objectives: i) detecting and identifying
Reliability, to understand changes in operation severity that may adversely Precursors to Fatigue Damage, ii) minimizing the number of sensors
affect the performance of the product. And this is just the beginning. through Collaborative Sensing, and iii) modifying the control laws to the
system current state within an Integrated State Awareness and Control.
This presentation will illustrate the framework that makes the Digital The presentation will provide an overview of damage precursor research
Industrial possible in the aircraft engine industry, connecting the dots and breakthroughs at ARL over the past two years. The local (nano and
between sensors, digital twin models, and analytics to provide additional microscale) understanding of the material evolution connection to
value to the customer. Examples will be provided to illustrate how meso-scale and then global stimuli (vibrations, shocks, and thermal cycles)
analytics are used to help the customer and product. The presentation and response at the macro-scale through Collaborative Sensing will be
will also discuss some of the challenges facing industry today, providing discussed. Connecting precursors detection and collaborative sensing to
context for future research directions. the vehicle control laws is profoundly a new innovation in achieving
bio-inspired health awareness and adaptation to extend the life of high
value systems.
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