Fault Tolerant More Electric Engine/Aircraft Architecture with Integrated Condition-Based Control

The demand of More Electric Engine/ Aircraft (MEE/ MEA) increases with the need of on-board electrification system for future aircraft. Also, moving towards More Electric Engine/Aircraft (MEE/MEA) concept can achieve better fuel benefit in the engine by controlling the split ratio of the power off-take from each of Low Pressure (LP) and High Pressure (HP) spools. Due to the trend of MEA and MEE integration with the power electronic driven technology, a higher reliability level of electrical power system is required to meet the minimum safety requirement during fault condition. A concept of intelligent system for mitigating the faults by identifying the best fault tolerant system configuration with the minimum load shedding is proposed in this paper. The proposed method not only mitigates the fault elimination from the electrical system but also maintains continuous mechanical power output from LP and HP spools in order to maintain optimum fuel benefit of the engine.

I. Introduction

THE progressive demand for All Electric Aircraft (AEA), is to reduce the weight and volume of the aircraft by replacing more mechanic, hydraulic and pneumatic system to electrical driven technology. Electrical onboard system for MEE/ MEA is not only to reduce the weight and environmental impact but also to provide better controllability on the aircraft power component and electrical distribution system. Developing a stable power supply and quick response in an emergency, integrating energy management system consisting of power generation, network distribution and hybrid energy storage can optimize the extracting power of the generator and engine control. This system not only achieves at high efficiency and low emission, but also benefits to lowest fuel burn with the integrated power management system (PMS) by scheduling the generators power and assistive energy storage with the advanced optimal load management.