Knowledge-based support in Non-Destructive Testing for health monitoring of aircraft structures

Maintenance manuals include general methods and procedures for industrial maintenance and they contain information about principles of maintenance methods. Particularly, Non-Destructive Testing (NDT) methods are important for the detection of aeronautical defects and they can be used for various kinds of material and in different environments. Conventional non-destructive evaluation inspections are done at periodic maintenance checks. Usually, the list of tools used in a maintenance program is simply located in the introduction of manuals, without any precision as regards to their characteristics, except for a short description of the manufacturer and tasks in which they are employed. Improving the identification concepts of the maintenance tools is needed to manage the set of equipments and establish a system of equivalence: it is necessary to have a consistent maintenance conceptualization, flexible enough to fit all current equipment, but also all those likely to be added/used in the future. Our contribution is related to the formal specification of the system of functional equivalences that can facilitate the maintenance activities with means to determine whether a tool can be substituted for another by observing their key parameters in the identified characteristics. Reasoning mechanisms of conceptual graphs constitute the baseline elements to measure the fit or unfit between an equipment model and a maintenance activity model. Graph operations are used for processing answers to a query and this graph-based approach to the search method is in-line with the logical view of information retrieval. The methodology described supports knowledge formalization and capitalization of experienced NDT practitioners. As a result, it enables the selection of a NDT technique and outlines its capabilities with acceptable alternatives

PM4 SMP model proposed for system reliability criticality assessment and maintainability improvement

This paper gives a practical systematic approach towards the maintenance procedure optimisation of a critical industrial unit in operation, to improve its maintainability. The resolution of the maintainability challenge in the industrial unit (Vibrating screen unit - VSU) was realised by performing a two-phase critical analysis, encompassing criticality and maintainability assessment. The criticality assessment comprised of failure investigation using fault tree analysis (FTA), vulnerability analysis using reliability block diagram (RBD), and failure mode effect and criticality analysis (FMECA). Furthermore, a maintainability assessment was performed on the industrial unit and improvement opportunities were identified. A generic model (PM4 Model) was conceptualised and used to improve the mean time to repair (MTTR) through a well-documented standard maintenance procedure (SMP)

Integrando conceitos de mantenabilidade e regras de interpretação na CBM: revisão sistemática da literatura / Integrating maintainability concepts and interpretation rules into CBM: a systematic literature review

A Condition-Based Maintenance (CBM) é uma estratégia de manutenção voltada para o estabelecimento de programas de monitoramento de condição. O monitoramento das variáveis de estado do sistema e o conhecimento das assinaturas de comportamento padrão e de falhas do equipamento, são aspectos fundamentais na aplicação da CBM. A capacidade de interpretação dessas informações é o ponto chave e possibilita a tomada de decisão de forma mais assertiva, visando atuação dentro das estratégias de mantenabilidade de forma a harmonizar os desempenhos desejados de confiabilidade e disponibilidade dos sistemas. Nesse sentido, este artigo tem como objetivo analisar a literatura sobre o conceito de mantenabilidade e suas principais abordagens, bem como sobre métodos para a definição de regras de interpretação para auxílio à tomada de decisão com base na condição de operação. Para isso, foi utilizada a metodologia revisão sistemática da literatura (RSL), operacionalizada pelo método proposto por Morandi e Camargo (2015). Como resultado, foram identificados os principais constructos relacionados às regras de interpretação, tomada de decisão e mantenabilidade dentro da abordagem CBM, visando auxiliar as empresas e a área de manutenção a melhorar seus processos internos para construção das regras para executar a CBM

Only non-energy benefits from the adoption of energy efficiency measures? A novel framework

© 2018 Elsevier Ltd Industrial energy efficiency has been widely recognized as a major contributor to the reduction of greenhouse gases emissions and improvement of industrial competitiveness. Nevertheless, a broad set of studies have pointed out the existence of barriers limiting the adoption of promising Energy Efficiency Measures (EEMs). Recently, scholars have shown the relevance of the so-called “non-energy benefits” (NEBs) coming from the adoption of EEMs for overcoming those barriers. Still, the existence of such benefits has been pointed out from specific studies and manuals for practitioners, but an overall framework describing them in terms of savings and benefits, as well as technical and management implications, is missing yet. Moreover, a considerable part of the scholars and of the practitioners just focuses on the identification and definition of the positive benefits deriving from these measures after they have been completely adopted, thus neglecting to describe the full set of both positive and negative effects occurring also during the implementation phase. Thus, starting from a literature review of scientific as well as practitioners’ studies, we have proposed a novel framework and characterization of the relevant items to be considered by an industrial decision-maker when deciding whether to adopt an EEM considering both the implementation and service phases. Hence, by taking this perspective, we have tested and validated the framework and the characterization in a two-step process: firstly, considering a set of EEMs well diffused and adopted in industry; secondly, investigating benefits and losses in ad-hoc selected manufacturing companies. Finally, considerations and implications are drawn from the preliminary validation and suggestion for further research are proposed, for both industrial decision-making as well as policy-making purposes

Yhdistetty testausjärjestelmä taajuusmuuttajasähkökäyttöjenkäyttöjen käyttöliittymätyökaluille

Testing is an important way to ensure the quality of embedded systems. To establish known testing environments and to obtain cost savings through automation, automated testing frameworks are built around them. This thesis presents a design of an automated testing framework that unifies automated testing frameworks of three different graphical user interface tools of variable speed drives. The new framework is named Unified testing framework and it allows testing that the three user interface tools work both together and with the variable speed drives. The thesis has a focus on embedded devices because variable speed drives and one of the user interface tools is an embedded device. The other two user interface tools are PC software and smartphone software. This thesis is structured to four parts. First a literature survey on theory of testing frameworks is conducted. Then the gained knowledge is applied into analyzing the three existing testing frameworks. After this analysis the design of the Unified testing framework is presented. The validity of the design is proven using a prototype. The validation is done based on its coverage, maintainability and performance.Testaus on tärkeä keino sulautettujen järjestelmien laadun varmistamisessa. Sulautetuille järjestelmille rakennetaan testausjärjestelmiä, jotta voidaan varmistua testausympäristöstä ja jotta testausta automatisoimalla saataisiin rahallisia säästöjä. Tämä työ esittelee automatisoidun testausjärjestelmän joka yhdistää kolme erillistä taajuusmuuttajasähkökäyttöjen graafisten käyttöliittämätyökalujen automatisoitua testausjärjestelmää. Uuden automatisoidun testausjärjestelmän nimi on Unified testing framework. Tämän uuden testausjärjestelmän avulla voidaan testata, että kaikki kolme käyttöliittymätyökalua toimivat oikein sekä keskenään, että taajuusmuuttajasähkökäyttöjen kanssa Tämä työ keskittyy sulautettuihin järjestelmiin, koska taajuusmuuttajasähkökäytöt ja yksi käyttöliittymätyökaluista on sulautettu järjestelmä. Kaksi muuta käyttöliittymätyökalua ovat tietokoneella ja älypuhelimella toimivia ohjelmistoja. Tämä työ on jaettu neljään osaan. Ensiksi tutustutaan testausjärjestelmien teoriaan kirjallisuuskatsauksen avulla. Tätä tietoa sitten sovelletaan analysoimaan alkuperäisiä testausjärjestelmiä. Tämän perusteella muodostetaan ja esitetään Unified testing frameworkin suunnitelma. Lopuksi Unified testing framework validoidaan käyttämällä apuna prototyyppiä. Validointi tapahtuu käyttämällä mittareina kattavuutta, ylläpidettävyyttä ja suorituskykyä