OPTOXENSE, INC. — Department of Defense SBIR Phase II: SB171-014

Description

Future TBCC propulsion systems, in addition to incorporatingvariablegeometricalenginefeatures,will require controllingtheengine duringits transient mode,as wellas,managingaerodynamicand thermal limits of thesystem over theentireflight range. Theimportantchallenges of TBCC enginesareto establish astablemodetransition process whilemaintaining propulsion system performanceand operability, perform astablecontrolled mode transition,avoid inletand/orengine unstart,and mitigatelow/high speed inlet/engineinteractions. optoXense-USF team is developinga novelgain scheduled model referenceadaptivecontrol (GS-MRAC)architecturefor TBCC engines,whereareferencemodel capturing desired system performanceisconstructed. In Phase-I,we developed initial GS-MRAC algorithm and softwaretool that has the potential to enableimproved reliability,resiliency,and reduced-costs for future TBCC-enginesystems. In Phase-II,validation of the proposed control technology will be performed,wherethe GS-MRAC strategy will be demonstrated for TBCC enginesmooth and stablemodetransition without inletand/orengine unstart.Weintend to fully verify ourcontrol system at thesoftware-level by developing a high-fidelity TBCC-enginemodel integrated with an MIPCC system and then conductcontrol hardware-in-the-loop test/verification experiments. The underlyingcontrol technologiescan be used for future hypersonic platforms and engines.