General Electric Company

General Electric Company Polska Sp. Z O.o.

Generale Electric Company Polska Sp. Z O.o

James Ryan Reepmeyer

Stefan Joseph Cafaro

Eric Richard Westervelt

Gagan Adibhatla

Arthur William Sibbach

Daniel Edward Mollmann

Arjan Johannes Hegeman

Inenhe Mohammed Khalid

Amit Zutshi

Rafal Sarba

Emad Andarawis Andarawis

Kirk Dennis Wallace

Cameron Roy Nott

Constantinos Minas

Erich Alois Krammer

Reza Ghaemi

Manxue Lu

R Sheldon Carpenter

Johan Michael Reimann

Robert R Rachedi

Koji Asari

Evin Nathaniel Barber

Terry Hei Tsun Ma

Richard Anthony Zelinski

Suchot Kongsomboonvech

Aaron James Schmitz

Frederick John Menditto, Iii

Rahim Panjwani

Iii Frederick John Menditto

An open rotor aeronautical engine may include a core engine, a plurality of unducted airfoils, and a pitch change assembly. The pitch change assembly may include an ensemble actuator assembly and a unitary actuator assembly. The ensemble actuator assembly may have one or more ensemble actuators and a unison ring that is movable by actuation of the one or more ensemble actuators to collectively change a pitch angle of the plurality of unducted airfoils. The unitary actuator assembly comprising a plurality of unitary actuators respectively coupled to a corresponding one of the plurality of unducted airfoils, the plurality of unitary actuators respectively movable to change the pitch angle of the corresponding one of the plurality of unducted airfoils.

Controlling excitation loads associated with open rotor aeronautical engines

An open rotor engine includes a core engine, a plurality of guide vanes positioned within or extending from the core engine; and a pitch change assembly operably coupled to the plurality of guide vanes. The pitch change assembly includes one or more actuators configured to change a pitch angle of respective ones of the plurality of guide vanes, and a plurality of linkage arms that are respectively movable by actuation of at least one of the one or more actuators. The plurality of linkage arms are directly or indirectly coupled to a corresponding one of the plurality of guide vanes. The plurality of linkage arms may have a length that differs from one another, and such length may orient a displacement or a range of motion of the respective linkage arm to an envelope of rotation about a guide vane axis that differs as between the plurality of guide vanes.

An integrated system and methods therefore are provided. An integrated system has individual power and/or thermal systems and a coordinated control system. The coordinated control system receives mission demands and priorities from an upstream system. The coordinated control system also receives a status and a prediction from each individual system, such as an individual system's operating mode status and its capability margin. The coordinated control system performs a conflict of interest check and generates a relative status for each individual system based on the status and predictions associated with the individual systems. The coordinated control system determines an operating mode and an allowed demand for each individual system based on the relative statuses and the mission demands and priorities. The coordinated control system outputs the operating modes to the individual systems and maps the allowed demands to individual system demands. The individual system demands are output to the individual systems.

Power and thermal management and coordinated control of an integrated system

A turbine engine for an aircraft includes a turbo-engine with a core air flow path, a fan having a fan shaft coupled to the turbo-engine to rotate the fan shaft, and a steam system. A combustor is positioned in the core air flow path to combust fuel and to generate combustion gases. The steam system is fluidly coupled to the core air flow path to provide steam to the core air flow path. The steam system includes a boiler to generate the steam, a water pump, and a controller. The water pump is in fluid communication with the boiler to direct a flow of water into the boiler. The controller is operatively coupled to the water pump to control the output of the water pump, the flow of the water into the boiler, and the amount of the steam injected into the core air flow path.

Turbine engine including a steam system

A gas turbine engine oil flow control system can include a variable flow oil pump useful to provide oil at varying rates to a variety of oil consumers, such as, power gearboxes, engine shaft bearings, electrical generators, etc. Oil flow control valves that have an ability to provide a variable flow of oil can be used in conjunction with the variable flow oil pump. Flow sensors can be used along with an oil flow controller to measure a flow of oil at various points in the gas turbine engine oil flow control system. The oil flow controller can use information from the flow sensors along with a variable consumption demand association with one or more of the oil consumers (either provided to the oil controller or calculated based upon an operational need of the oil consumer) to change operation of the variable flow oil pump and/or oil flow control valve.

Gas turbine engine oil flow control system

A fuel flow measuring system includes an ultrasonic fuel flow sensor. The fuel flow sensor includes a first transducer and a second transducer. The first transducer is excited at multiple different excitation frequencies and a voltage, an electric current, and a phase difference between the voltage and the electric current is sensed at the first transducer during excitation. Data points are generated based on the sensed readings and a model is fit to the data points to determine a complex impedance spectrum. The complex impedance spectrum indicates a range of excitation frequencies within a range of a peak resonance frequency of the first transducer. One or more characteristics of excitation signals directed to the second transducer are set based on the determined complex impedance spectrum. In this manner, the signal to noise ratio of ultrasonic signals emitted by the second transducer and received by the first transducer can be maximized.

Ultrasonic fuel flow measuring systems and methods

Ultrasonic fuel flow measuring systems and methods of setting characteristics of excitation signals

A method of controlling an aeronautical gas turbine engine may be performed with an electronic controller. The method may include determining an airfoil pitch control command for at least one of a plurality of airfoils of the aeronautical gas turbine engine based at least in part on an excitation load acting upon the aeronautical gas turbine engine, and outputting the airfoil pitch control command to one or more actuators actuatable to change a pitch angle of the at least one of the plurality of airfoils. The airfoil pitch control command may be configured to augment and/or compensate for the excitation load acting upon the aeronautical gas turbine engine. The method may be embodied by a non-transitory computer-readable medium that includes computer-executable instructions, which when executed by a processor associated with the electronic controller, cause the electronic controller to perform the method.

A method of transient control of a thermal transport bus of a turbomachine includes measuring a measured temperature and a measured pressure of a working fluid; determining a selected run state of a turbomachine, wherein the selected run state is one of a plurality of run states; selecting a desired operating condition comprising a desired temperature range and a desired pressure range as a function of a desired state of the working fluid; comparing the measured temperature with the desired temperature range, and comparing the measured pressure with the desired pressure range; and modulating control of the thermal transport bus as a function of the comparing of the measured temperature with the desired temperature range and the comparing of the measured pressure with the desired pressure range.

Transient control of a thermal transport bus

Systems and methods are disclosed for estimating or determining a rate or an amount of fuel coke formation in a fuel system, such as of a gas turbine engine. The system is operable to control a rate of fuel coke formation. The system may include a sensor that measures an operating parameter associated with fuel coke formation in the fuel system. A controller is in communication with the sensor to receive the signal therefrom for determining an amount or a rate of fuel coking in the fuel system. Based on this determination the controller may adjust the rate of fuel coke formation by adjusting the operation of the turbine engine, a thermal management system of the turbine engine, or the fuel system.

Systems and methods for controlling fuel coke formation

A control system for active stability management of a compressor element of a turbine engine is provided. In one example aspect, the control system includes one or more computing devices configured to receive data indicative of an operating characteristic associated with the compressor element. For instance, the data can be received from a high frequency sensor operable to sense pressure at the compressor element. The computing devices are also configured to determine, by a machine-learned model, a stall margin remaining of the compressor element based at least in part on the received data. The machine-learned model is trained to recognize certain characteristics of the received data and associate the characteristics with a stall margin remaining of the compressor element. The computing devices are also configured to cause adjustment of one or more engine systems based at least in part on the determined stall margin remaining.

Application of machine learning to process high-frequency sensor signals of a turbine engine

A monitoring and control system for a flow duct and a method for determining a component status of an operational component disposed within a flow passage of the flow duct utilizing the system are provided. In one exemplary aspect, the system includes at least two sensors that are disposed within the flow passage and configured to sense a characteristic of a fluid flowing therethrough. The sensors may be averaging sensors. Each sensor extends circumferentially about an axial centerline defined by the flow duct. The sensors are arranged in an overlapped arrangement. Particularly, the sensors extend circumferentially about the axial centerline such that the sensors physically overlap one another circumferentially. Additionally, the sensors may be disposed within the same or substantially the same plane axially. Signals generated by the sensors may be utilized to monitor and control the fluid and various operational components disposed within the flow passage.

Monitoring and control system for a flow duct

A fleet mission control system for a network of aerial vehicles including power thermal management systems is provided. According to examples of the disclosed technology a control system receives one or more mission objectives for a network of aircraft including two or more aerial vehicles. Each aerial vehicle includes a power-thermal management system. The control system receives system state information for the network of aircraft. The system state information includes PTMS state data. The control system determines a set of aircraft commands for the network of aircraft based on the one or more mission objectives and the PTMS state data, and generates an output signal based on the set of aircraft commands.

Fleet mission advisor

Some embodiments provide a distributed optimization framework and technology for the control of aggregated propulsion system components that iteratively operates until a commanded propulsion-related profile is produced by aggregated components of the propulsion system. Some embodiments use a distributed iterative solution in which each component solves a local optimization problem with local constraints and states, while using global variables that are based upon information from each other component. The global variables may be determined via a distributed transaction system using component-specific information obtained from each component at each iteration. The global variables may be broadcast to the components for each new iteration.

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Cincinnati, OH, United States of America

James Ryan Reepmeyer