A USN Strategy for Mechanical and Propulsion Systems Diagnostics and Prognostics, Life Usage Monitoring and Damage Tolerance: Applications to Aging Aircraft Problems

A US Navy strategy has been generated to develop and demonstrate diagnostics, prognostics, health management and life management for propulsion and mechanical systems. How this overall strategy has evolved and the current status will be presented. The SH-60 platform was selected for the first proof- of-concept effort to develop, demonstrate, and integrate available and advanced mechanical diagnostic technologies for propulsion and power drive system monitoring. Included in these technologies were various rule based and model-based analysis techniques that were applied to demonstrate and validate various levels of diagnostic and prognostic capabilities. These will be discussed and updated. Using past "seeded fault" tests as case examples, various diagnostic methods were used to identify the faults, and various means - of applying prognostics, health management and life management are discussed. Other more recent examples of "seeded faults" and related tests will also be discussed as case studies, demonstrating various degrees of diagnostic, prognostic, health management and life management capabilities. Relative rating of the performance of some of the different analysis techniques evaluated will also be discussed.