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At least 487 records · Page 27

Design of an Advanced Inlet Liner for the Quiet Technology Demonstrator 3

The utilization of advanced fan designs (including higher bypass ratios) and shorter engine nacelles has highlighted a need for increased fan noise reduction over a broad frequency range. Thus, improved broadband liner designs must account for these constraints and take advantage of novel liner configurations. With these observations in mind, the development and assessment of a broadband acoustic liner optimization process has been pursued through a series of design and experimental studies. In this work, an advanced inlet liner was designed for a Boeing 737MAX-7 to reduce drag and to improve the broadband noise reduction relative to conventional liners in use today. Specifically, a three layer liner was designed, fabricated, and flight tested as part of the Quiet Technology Demonstrator 3 flight test program. Initial tonal predictions captured the behavior of the measured data very well and both prediction and measurements show an increased acoustic benefit at larger observer angles, particularly at the takeoff condition. Ultimately, flight test results showed the three degree-of-freedom liner to provide a 3.2 EPNdB cumulative inlet component benefit and a 0.7 EPNdB cumulative airplane benefit over the production liner. This excellent result provides valuable validation of the broadband liner design process, as well as the enhancements made to the overall approach. It also illustrates the value of the design process in concurrently evaluating various liner designs (i.e., SDOF, MDOF, etc.) and their application to various locations. Thus, the design process may be applied with further confidence to investigate novel liner configurations in future design studies.

Nark, Douglas M.↗

Numerical analysis of a thermal deicer

An algorithm has been developed to numerically model the concurrent phenomena of two-dimensional transient heat transfer, ice accretion and ice shedding which arise from the use of an electrothermal pad. The Alternating Direction Implicit method is used to simultaneously solve the heat transfer and accretion equations occurring in a multilayered body covered with ice. In order to model the phase change between ice and water, a technique was used which assumes a phase for each node. This allows the equations to be linearized such that a direct solution is possible. This technique requires an iterative procedure to find the correct phase at each node. The computer program developed to find this solution has been integrated with the NASA/Lewis flow/trajectory code LEWICE.

Wright, W. B.↗

Numerical simulation of icing, deicing, and shedding

An algorithm has been developed to numerically model the concurrent phenomena of two-dimensional transient heat transfer, ice accretion, ice shedding and ice trajectory which arise from the use of electrothermal pad. The Alternating Direction Implicit method is used to simultaneously solve the heat transfer and accretion equations occurring in the multilayered body covered with ice. In order to model the phase change between ice and water, a technique was used which assumes a phase for each node. This allows the equations to be linearized such that a direct solution is possible. This technique requires an iterative procedure to find the correct phase at each node. The computer program developed to find this solution has been integrated with the NASA-Lewis flow/trajectory code LEWICE.

Wright, W. B.↗

Real-time flight test analysis and display techniques for the X-29A aircraft

The X-29A advanced technology demonstrator flight envelope expansion program and the subsequent flight research phase gave impetus to the development of several innovative real-time analysis and display techniques. These new techniques produced significant improvements in flight test productivity, flight research capabilities, and flight safety. These techniques include real-time measurement and display of in-flight structural loads, dynamic structural mode frequency and damping, flight control system dynamic stability and control response, aeroperformance drag polars, and aircraft specific excess power. Several of these analysis techniques also provided for direct comparisons of flight-measured results with analytical predictions. The aeroperformance technique was made possible by the concurrent development of a new simplified in-flight net thrust computation method. To achieve these levels of on-line flight test analysis, integration of ground and airborne systems was required. The capability of NASA Ames Research Center, Dryden Flight Research Facility's Western Aeronautical Test Range was a key factor in enabling implementation of these methods.

Hicks, John W.↗

Real-time flight test analysis and display techniques for the X-29A aircraft

The X-29A advanced technology demonstrator flight envelope expansion program and the subsequent flight research phase gave impetus to the development of several innovative real-time analysis and display techniques. These new techniques produced significant improvements in flight test productivity, flight research capabilities, and flight safety. These techniques include real-time measurement and display of in-flight structural loads, dynamic structural mode frequency and damping, flight control system dynamic stability and control response, aeroperformance drag polars, and aircraft specific excess power. Several of these analysis techniques also provided for direct comparisons of flight-measured results with analytical predictions. The aeroperformance technique was made possible by the concurrent development of a new simplified in-flight net thrust computation method. To achieve these levels of on-line flight test analysis, integration of ground and airborne systems was required. The capability of NASA Ames Research Center, Dryden Flight Research Facility's Western Aeronautical Test Range was a key factor to enable implementation of these methods.

Hicks, John W.↗

Experience with Aero- and Fluid-Dynamic Testing for Engineering and CFD Validation

Ever since computations have been used to simulate aerodynamics the need to ensure that the computations adequately represent real life has followed. Many experiments have been performed specifically for validation and as computational methods have improved, so have the validation experiments. Validation is also a moving target because computational methods improve requiring validation for the new aspect of flow physics that the computations aim to capture. Concurrently, new measurement techniques are being developed that can help capture more detailed flow features pressure sensitive paint (PSP) and particle image velocimetry (PIV) come to mind. This paper will present various wind-tunnel tests the author has been involved with and how they were used for validation of various kinds of CFD. A particular focus is the application of advanced measurement techniques to flow fields (and geometries) that had proven to be difficult to predict computationally. Many of these difficult flow problems arose from engineering and development problems that needed to be solved for a particular vehicle or research program. In some cases the experiments required to solve the engineering problems were refined to provide valuable CFD validation data in addition to the primary engineering data. All of these experiments have provided physical insight and validation data for a wide range of aerodynamic and acoustic phenomena for vehicles ranging from tractor-trailers to crewed spacecraft.

experiment↗

Directions in parallel programming: HPF, shared virtual memory and object parallelism in pC++

Fortran and C++ are the dominant programming languages used in scientific computation. Consequently, extensions to these languages are the most popular for programming massively parallel computers. We discuss two such approaches to parallel Fortran and one approach to C++. The High Performance Fortran Forum has designed HPF with the intent of supporting data parallelism on Fortran 90 applications. HPF works by asking the user to help the compiler distribute and align the data structures with the distributed memory modules in the system. Fortran-S takes a different approach in which the data distribution is managed by the operating system and the user provides annotations to indicate parallel control regions. In the case of C++, we look at pC++ which is based on a concurrent aggregate parallel model.

Bodin, Francois↗

Cold-Flow Testing of a Proposed Integrated Center-Body Diffuser/Steam Blocker Concept for Plum Brook Station's B-2 Test Facility

The center-body diffuser (CBD) steam blocker (SB) system is a concept that incorporates a set of secondary drive nozzles into the envelope of a CBD, such that both nozzle systems (i.e., the rocket engine and the steam blocking nozzles) utilize the same supersonic diffuser, and will operate either singularly or concurrently. In this manner, the SB performs as an exhaust system stage when the rocket engine is not operating, and virtually eliminates discharge flow on rocket engine shutdown. A 2.25-percent scale model of a proposed SB integrated into a diffuser for the Plum Brook B-2 facility was constructed and cold-flow tested for the purpose of evaluating performance characteristics of various design options. These specific design options addressed secondary drive nozzle design (method of steam injection), secondary drive nozzle location relative to CBD throat, and center-body throat length to diameter (L/D) ratios. The objective of the test program is to identify the desired configuration to carry forward should the next phase of design proceed. The tested scale model can provide data for various pressure ratios; however, its design is based on a proposed B-2 spray chamber (SC) operating pressure of 4.0 psia and a steam supply pressure of 165 psia. Evaluation of the test data acquired during these tests indicate that either the discrete axial or annular nozzle configuration integrated into a CBD, with an annular throat length of 1.5 L/D at the nominal injection position, would be suitable to carry forward from the SB's perspective. Selection between these two then becomes more a function of constructability and implementation than performance. L/D also has some flexibility, and final L/D selection can be a function of constructability issues within a limited range.

Edwards, Daryl A.↗

Methodology for object-oriented real-time systems analysis and design: Software engineering

Successful application of software engineering methodologies requires an integrated analysis and design life-cycle in which the various phases flow smoothly 'seamlessly' from analysis through design to implementation. Furthermore, different analysis methodologies often lead to different structuring of the system so that the transition from analysis to design may be awkward depending on the design methodology to be used. This is especially important when object-oriented programming is to be used for implementation when the original specification and perhaps high-level design is non-object oriented. Two approaches to real-time systems analysis which can lead to an object-oriented design are contrasted: (1) modeling the system using structured analysis with real-time extensions which emphasizes data and control flows followed by the abstraction of objects where the operations or methods of the objects correspond to processes in the data flow diagrams and then design in terms of these objects; and (2) modeling the system from the beginning as a set of naturally occurring concurrent entities (objects) each having its own time-behavior defined by a set of states and state-transition rules and seamlessly transforming the analysis models into high-level design models. A new concept of a 'real-time systems-analysis object' is introduced and becomes the basic building block of a series of seamlessly-connected models which progress from the object-oriented real-time systems analysis and design system analysis logical models through the physical architectural models and the high-level design stages. The methodology is appropriate to the overall specification including hardware and software modules. In software modules, the systems analysis objects are transformed into software objects.

Schoeffler, James D.↗

Environmentally regulated aerospace coatings

Aerospace coatings represent a complex technology which must meet stringent performance requirements in the protection of aerospace vehicles. Topcoats and primers are used, primarily, to protect the structural elements of the air vehicle from exposure to and subsequent degradation by environmental elements. There are also many coatings which perform special functions, i.e., chafing resistance, rain erosion resistance, radiation and electric effects, fuel tank coatings, maskants, wire and fastener coatings. The scheduled promulgation of federal environmental regulations for aerospace manufacture and rework materials and processes will regulate the emissions of photochemically reactive precursors to smog and air toxics. Aerospace organizations will be required to identify, qualify and implement less polluting materials. The elimination of ozone depleting chemicals (ODC's) and implementation of pollution prevention requirements are added constraints which must be addressed concurrently. The broad categories of operations affected are the manufacture, operation, maintenance, and repair of military, commercial, general aviation, and space vehicles. The federal aerospace regulations were developed around the precept that technology had to be available to support the reduction of organic and air toxic emissions, i.e., the regulations cannot be technology forcing. In many cases, the regulations which are currently in effect in the South Coast Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD), located in Southern California, were used as the baseline for the federal regulations. This paper addresses strategies used by Southern California aerospace organizations to cope with these regulatory impacts on aerospace productions programs. All of these regulatory changes are scheduled for implementation in 1993 and 1994, with varying compliance dates established.

Morris, Virginia L.↗

A Survey of Applications and Research in Integrated Design Systems Technology

The initial part of the study was begun with a combination of literature searches, World Wide Web searches, and contacts with individuals and companies who were known to members of our team to have an interest in topics that seemed to be related to our study. There is a long list of such topics, such as concurrent engineering, design for manufacture, life-cycle engineering, systems engineering, systems integration, systems design, design systems, integrated product and process approaches, enterprise integration, integrated product realization, and similar terms. These all capture, at least in part, the flavor of what we describe here as integrated design systems. An inhibiting factor in this inquiry was the absence of agreed terminology for the study of integrated design systems. It is common for the term to be applied to what are essentially augmented Computer-Aided Design (CAD) systems, which are integrated only to the extent that agreements have been reached to attach proprietary extensions to proprietary CAD programs. It is also common for some to use the term integrated design systems to mean a system that applies only, or mainly, to the design phase of a product life cycle. It is likewise common for many of the terms listed earlier to be used as synonyms for integrated design systems. We tried to avoid this ambiguity by adopting the definition of integrated design systems that is implied in the introductory notes that we provided to our contacts, cited earlier. We thus arrived at this definition: Integrated Design Systems refers to the integration of the different tools and processes that comprise the engineering, of complex systems. It takes a broad view of the engineering of systems, to include consideration of the entire product realization process and the product life cycle. An important aspect of integrated design systems is the extent to which they integrate existing, "islands of automation" into a comprehensive design and product realization environment. As the study progressed, we relied increasingly upon a networking approach to lead us to new information. The departure point for such searches often was a government-sponsored project or a company initiative. The advantage of this approach was that short conversations with knowledgeable persons would usually cut through confusion over differences of terminology, thereby somewhat reducing the search space of the study. Even so, it was not until late in our eight-month inquiry that we began to see signs of convergence of the search, in the sense that a number of the latest inquiries began to turn up references to earlier contacts. As suggested above, this convergence often occurred with respect to particular government or company projects.

Source record↗

Evaluation of composite components on the Bell 206L and Sikorsky S-76 helicopters

Progress on two programs to evaluate structural composite components in flight service on Bell 206L and Sikorsky S-76 commercial helicopters is described. Forty ship sets of composite components that include the litter door, baggage door, forward fairing, and vertical fin have been installed on Bell Model 206L helicopters that are operating in widely different climates. Component installation started in 1981 and selected components were removed and tested at prescribed intervals over a ten year evaluation. Four horizontal stabilizers and eleven tail rotor spars that are production components on the S-76 helicopter were tested after prescribed periods of service to determine the effects of the operating environment on their performance. Concurrent with the flight evaluation, materials used to fabricate the components were exposed in ground racks and tested at specified intervals to determine the effects of outdoor environments. Results achieved from 123,000 hours of accumulated service on the Bell 206L components and 53,000 hours on the Sikorsky S-76 components are reported. Seventy-eight Bell 206L components were removed and tested statically. Results of seven years of ground exposure of materials used to fabricate the Bell 206L components are presented. Results of tests on four Sikorsky S-76 horizontal stabilizers and eleven tail rotor spars are also presented. Panels of material used to fabricate the Sikorsky S-76 components that were exposed for six years were tested and results are presented.

Baker, Donald J.↗

The high level trigger and express data production at STAR

To meet the demands of the Beam Energy Scan phase-II (BES-II) program, the STAR experiment at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) developed a dual real-time framework consisting of a High Level Trigger (HLT) and an Express Data Production system (xProduction). The HLT operates online within the Data Acquisition (DAQ) chain on a dedicated multi-core CPU cluster with the option to offload compute-intensive kernels to Xeon Phi coprocessors. It uses parallelized algorithms, such as the Cellular Automaton (CA) Track Finder, to perform rapid tracking, vertexing, and event filtering. This allows it to select events of interest in real time and provide immediate feedback on detector and beam conditions. In contrast, the xProduction workflow runs concurrently and independently of the DAQ loop. It applies near offline-quality calibration and reconstruction within hours of data collection. The xProduction input is the express data stream, whose content can be enriched by HLT trigger/priority selections under DAQ/HLT resource constraints, and it uses the STAR calibration/conditions framework, incorporating online calibration/QA information when available. This enables early preliminary physics analysis, including the reconstruction of rare signals, such as hyperons and hypernuclei. It also provides collaboration-wide access to analysis-ready datasets. Together, the HLT and xProduction systems form a complementary architecture: the HLT performs online event selection while the xProduction chain delivers high-quality results within a short amount of time. This integrated framework has enabled the prompt reconstruction of the $^5_Λ$ He hypernucleus with high statistical significance and the efficient processing of hundreds of millions of heavy-ion collision events. In conclusion, its demonstrated scalability and robustness establish a model for future high-luminosity experiments requiring both online event filtering and rapid access to analysis-quality data.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗

Evaluation of Composite Components on the Bell 206L and Sikorsky S-76 Helicopters

Progress on two programs to evaluate structural composite parts in flight service on Bell 206L and Sikorsky S-76 commercial helicopters is described. Forty ship sets of composite parts that include the litter door, baggage door, forward fairing, and vertical fin were installed on Bell Model 206L helicopters that are operating in widely different climates. Part installation started in 1981 and selected parts are being removed and tested at prescribed intervals over a 10 yr evaluation. Four horizontal stabilizers and eleven tail rotor spars that are production parts on the S-76 helicopter are being tested after prescribed periods of service to determine the effects of the operating environment on their performance. Concurrent with the flight evaluation, materials used to fabricate the parts are being exposed in ground racks and tested at specified intervals to determine the effects of outdoor environments. Results achieved from 123,000 hrs of accumulated service on the Bell 206L parts and 53,000 hrs on the Sikorsky S-76 parts are reported. Seventy-eight Bell 206L parts were removed and tested statically. Results of 7 yrs of ground exposure of materials used to make the Bell 206L parts are presented.

Baker, Donald J.↗

Risk of Cardiac Rhythm Problems During Spaceflight

NASA has concerns regarding the incidence and clinical significance of cardiac arrhythmias that could occur during long-term exposure to the spaceflight environment, such as on the International Space Station (ISS) or during a prolonged (e.g., up to 3 years) sojourn to Mars or on the Moon. There have been some anecdotal reports and a few documented cases of cardiac arrhythmias in space, including one documented episode of non-sustained ventricular tachycardia. The potential catastrophic nature of a sudden cardiac death in the remote space environment has led to concerns from the early days of the space program that spaceflight might be arrhythmogenic. Indeed, there are known and well-defined changes in the cardiovascular system with spaceflight: a) plasma volume is reduced, b) left ventricular mass is decreased, and c) the autonomic nervous system adapts to the weightless environment. Combined, these physiologic adaptations suggest that changes in cardiac structure and neuro-humoral environment during spaceflight could alter electrical conduction, although the evidence supporting this contention consists mostly of minor changes in QT interval (the time between the start of the Q wave and the end of the T wave on an electrocardiogram tracing) in a small number of astronauts after long-duration spaceflight. Concurrent with efforts by NASA Medical Operations to refine and improve screening techniques relevant to arrhythmias and cardiovascular disease, as NASA enters the era of exploration-class missions it will be critical to determine with the highest degree of certainty whether spaceflight by itself alters cardiac structure and function sufficiently to increase the risk of arrhythmias.

Lee, Stuart M. C.↗

The force on the flex: Global parallelism and portability

A parallel programming methodology, called the force, supports the construction of programs to be executed in parallel by an unspecified, but potentially large, number of processes. The methodology was originally developed on a pipelined, shared memory multiprocessor, the Denelcor HEP, and embodies the primitive operations of the force in a set of macros which expand into multiprocessor Fortran code. A small set of primitives is sufficient to write large parallel programs, and the system has been used to produce 10,000 line programs in computational fluid dynamics. The level of complexity of the force primitives is intermediate. It is high enough to mask detailed architectural differences between multiprocessors but low enough to give the user control over performance. The system is being ported to a medium scale multiprocessor, the Flex/32, which is a 20 processor system with a mixture of shared and local memory. Memory organization and the type of processor synchronization supported by the hardware on the two machines lead to some differences in efficient implementations of the force primitives, but the user interface remains the same. An initial implementation was done by retargeting the macros to Flexible Computer Corporation's ConCurrent C language. Subsequently, the macros were caused to directly produce the system calls which form the basis for ConCurrent C. The implementation of the Fortran based system is in step with Flexible Computer Corporations's implementation of a Fortran system in the parallel environment.

Jordan, H. F.↗

Interim report on Landsat national archive activities

The Department of the Interior (DOI) has the responsibility to preserve and to distribute most Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) and Multispectral Scanner (MSS) data that have been acquired by the five Landsat satellites operational since July 1972. Data that are still covered by exclusive marketing rights, which were granted by the U.S. Government to the commercial Landsat operator, cannot be distributed by the DOI. As the designated national archive for Landsat data, the U.S. Geological Survey's EROS Data Center (EDC) has initiated two new programs to protect and make available any of the 625,000 MSS scenes currently archived and the 200,000 TM scenes to be archived at EDC by 1995. A specially configured system has begun converting Landsat MSS data from obsolete high density tapes (HDT's) to more dense digital cassette tapes. After transcription, continuous satellite swaths are (1) divided into standard scenes defined by a world reference system, (2) geographically located by latitude and longitude, and (3) assessed for overall quality. Digital browse images are created by subsampling the full-resolution swaths. Conversion of the TM HDT's will begin in the fourth quarter of 1992 and will be conducted concurrently with MSS conversion. Although the TM archive is three times larger than the entire MSS archive, conversion of data from both sensor systems and consolidation of the entire Landsat archive at EDC will be completed by the end of 1994. Some MSS HDT's have deteriorated, primarily as a result of hydrolysis of the pigment binder. Based on a small sample of the 11 terabytes of post-1978 MSS data and the 41 terabytes of TM data to be converted, it appears that to date, less than 2 percent of the data have been lost. The data loss occurs within small portions of some scenes; few scenes are lost entirely. Approximately 10,000 pre-1979 MSS HDT's have deteriorated to such an extent, as a result of hydrolysis, that the data cannot be recovered without special treatment of the tapes. An independent consulting division of a major tape manufacturer has analyzed affected tapes and is confident that restorative procedures can be applied to the HDT's to permit one pass to reproduce the data on another recording media. A system to distribute minimally processed Landsat data will be procured in 1992 and will be operational by mid-1994. Any TM or MSS data in the national archive that are not restricted by exclusive marketing rights will be reproduced directly from the archive media onto user specified computer-compatible media. TM data will be produced either at a raw level (radiometrically and geometrically uncorrected) or at an intermediate level (radiometrically corrected and geometrically indexed). MSS data will be produced to an intermediate level or to a fully corrected level (radiometrically corrected and geometrically transformed to an Oblique Mercator projection). The system will be capable of providing ordered scenes within 48 hours of receipt of order.

Boyd, John E.↗

Reformulating Non-Monotonic Theories for Inference and Updating

We aim to help build programs that do large-scale, expressive non-monotonic reasoning (NMR): especially, 'learning agents' that store, and revise, a body of conclusions while continually acquiring new, possibly defeasible, premise beliefs. Currently available procedures for forward inference and belief revision are exhaustive, and thus impractical: they compute the entire non-monotonic theory, then re-compute from scratch upon updating with new axioms. These methods are thus badly intractable. In most theories of interest, even backward reasoning is combinatoric (at least NP-hard). Here, we give theoretical results for prioritized circumscription that show how to reformulate default theories so as to make forward inference be selective, as well as concurrent; and to restrict belief revision to a part of the theory. We elaborate a detailed divide-and-conquer strategy. We develop concepts of structure in NM theories, by showing how to reformulate them in a particular fashion: to be conjunctively decomposed into a collection of smaller 'part' theories. We identify two well-behaved special cases that are easily recognized in terms of syntactic properties: disjoint appearances of predicates, and disjoint appearances of individuals (terms). As part of this, we also definitionally reformulate the global axioms, one by one, in addition to applying decomposition. We identify a broad class of prioritized default theories, generalizing default inheritance, for which our results especially bear fruit. For this asocially monadic class, decomposition permits reasoning to be localized to individuals (ground terms), and reduced to propositional. Our reformulation methods are implementable in polynomial time, and apply to several other NM formalisms beyond circumscription.

Grosof, Benjamin N.↗