General Electric Company

Gregory Lee Detweiler

Pradeep Vijayan

Robert Charles Hon

Thomas William Brown

Paul Robert Gemin

Alan Gregory Murphy

A power system operable to implement a power balancing control scheme is provided. In one aspect, a power system includes multiple independent power supplies with independent batteries feeding onto a common power bus. The power supplies regulate the voltage on the common power bus at the same time. The power balancing control scheme, when implemented, causes the load on the common power bus to be shared among the individual power supplies with a specified load distribution. The specified load distribution can be set or determined to balance the State of Charge (SoC) of the batteries over time whilst taking into account the constraints or limits of the elements of the power system.

Loading sharing across mulitple power supplies

An aircraft that includes a hybrid-electric propulsion system is provided. In one aspect, the hybrid-electric propulsion system includes at least one propulsor that includes a gas turbine engine and an electric machine mechanically coupled with a spool of the gas turbine engine. When idle operation is commanded, electrical power is provided to the electric machine to cause the electric machine to apply torque to the spool and fuel provided to the engine can be reduced. Thus, the electric machine is controlled to provide a power assist to maintain the engine at the commanded idle speed whilst reducing fuel consumption.

Electric machine power assist of turbine engine during idle operation

A power system () operable to implement a power balancing control scheme is provided. In one aspect, a power system () includes multiple independent power supplies (A,B) with independent batteries (A,B) feeding onto a common power bus (). The power supplies (A,B) regulate the voltage on the common power bus () at the same time. The power balancing control scheme, when implemented, causes the load on the common power bus () to be shared among the individual power supplies (A,B) with a specified load distribution. The specified load distribution can be set or determined to balance the State of Charge (SoC) of the batteries (A,B) over time whilst taking into account the constraints or limits of the elements (A,B,A,B) of the power system ().

Loading sharing across multiple power supplies

An engine defining a longitudinal axis includes: a turbomachine; a fan drivingly coupled with the turbomachine, the fan being a forward thrust fan and having: a hub; a plurality of fan blades, the plurality of fan blades comprising a first fan blade; and a flapping hinge integrated into the first fan blade or coupled to the fan blade, at least a portion of the first fan blade moveable about the flapping hinge to define a variable angle with the longitudinal axis.

Flapping hinge for a fan blade

A system for controlling a motor includes a controller module comprising a controller portion, a regulator portion and an integrator portion. The regulator portion includes a set of regulator modules communicatively coupled in a sequence. Each regulator module configured to receive a respective input signal, indicative of a target or selected value, from the controller portion or the immediately preceding regulator module in the sequence, determine a respective selectable value; select one of the respective selectable value and the value indicated by the received input signal; and provide the selected value as an output signal to the next regulator module in the sequence or the integrator module. The integrator module is configured to receive the output signal from the last regulator module in the sequence, calculate a final demand value based on the received signal, and provide an output signal indicative of the final demand value.

Growing community of inventors

Cincinatti, OH, United States of America

Gregory Lee Detweiler