NASA recently rated Ridgetop’s performance excellent in all categories at the conclusion of a NASA Research Announcement (NRA) contract for integrated vehicle health management (IVHM) technology development. A NASA offiial wrote, “The quality of the product was excellent and exceeded expectations! Contractors went out of their way to make sure that the product was satisfactory. The results should be directly applicable to the IVHM project's goal.”

NASA has a goal to develop autonomic technologies that detect system/component degradation and damage early enough to prevent or gracefully recover from in-flight failures. These technologies will enable nearly continuous on-board situational awareness of the vehicle health state for use by the flight crew, ground crew, and maintenance depot. Ridgetop’s role was to develop diagnostic and prognostic methodologies to assess the state of health (SoH) and estimate the remaining useful life (RUL) of the power electronics employed in a typical avionic electromechanical actuator (EMA) subsystem.

Through quality collaboration with NASA’s Ames Research Center (ARC), Ridgetop delivered a model-based laboratory test fixture to identify and characterize the fault-to-failure progression (FFP) signatures of dominant failure modes associated with the EMA servo drive, and to analyze the propagation of damage through the drive. This testbed includes a high-fidelity computer model correlated with the laboratory testbed to enable further analysis of simulated motor drive faults and damage propagation. The testbed will be integrated with the ARC Advanced Diagnostics and Prognostics Testbed (ADAPT) to simulate in-situ EMA failure modes and logistics.

The test fixture, shown in Figure 1, proves the efficacy of Ridgetop’s technology. The non-intrusive monitoring technology can easily be adapted for in-flight emulation of real-time actuator control signals and load profiles.

Figure 1: EMA Emulator Testbed

Ridgetop is proud to have been awarded important contracts from five different NASA facilities involving electronic prognostics and electronics for harsh environments. At NASA ARC, Ridgetop’s innovations from this NRA Program will be seen by visiting scientists and engineers from other NASA Mission Directorates across the country.

Based on its successful track record, Ridgetop has been invited to be a key subcontractor and team member for larger Prime Contractor proposals for the new ARES V and Altair Lunar Lander NASA programs. Other current programs from NASA that Ridgetop has won include advanced work on precision measurement and monitoring of fuel cells, and advanced P1451-based sensor interface development.

"We are gratified by the positive feedback that we have received from NASA over the years," said Ridgetop CEO Doug Goodman. "Both of the new programs from NASA are very promising, and I have high expectations on the success of these exciting programs, as we have had with the NRA.”

If you would like Ridgetop to evaluate the application of this non-intrusive monitoring technology to your electromechanical actuators or power systems, please contact Sonia Vohnout, Sonia.Vohnout@RidgetopGroup.com.

A detailed white paper about the EMA Emulator IVHM project is available on the Ridgetop Group website, at http://www.ridgetopgroup.com/pubs/whitepapers/NASA_NRA_IVHM_Whitepaper_EMA.pdf

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