PRECISION COMBUSTION, INC. — Department of Defense SBIR Phase I: N212-127

Description

Precision Combustion, Inc. (PCI) novel frangible coating will be designed to extend the maintenance and overhaul interval for “last chance” filters by at least a factor of 5, reducing maintenance cost, and improving reliability and MTBF for aircraft engines.  We propose to leverage our experience with coating mesh screens to deposit a thin, uniform and frangible layered coating onto last-chance screens to prevent deposition of carbonaceous by-products from blocking critical fuel passages. Our coating is durable, has good lubricity and resistance to coking and conforms to Navy requirements.  Our approach will allow us to engineer the frangibility to achieve targeted exposure and temperature and resulting life between overhauls with a target of a 5 times increase in MTBO. In Phase 1 of the project we will focus on optimizing the coating to achieve the proposed operational target. PCI will select the frangible coating concept (or combination of concepts) that was most successfully demonstrated during this period and continue testing for cyclic and lifetime durability. In Phase 2 of the project, we will evaluate the coating properties at the larger scale with particular emphasis on fuel system flow conditions and geometries expected in a real aircraft fuel system. Multiple iterations will be executed to reach the 5X MTBO lifetime as predicted from the Phase1 proof-of-concept data. The coating composition and procedure will be applied to other components of interest in the refueling system especially the fuel nozzles under the same test and operating conditions.