Real-Time Monitoring and Fault Diagnostics in Roll-To-Roll Manufacturing Systems

A roll-to-roll (R2R) process is a manufacturing technique involving continuous processing of a flexible substrate as it is transferred between rotating rolls. It integrates many additive and subtractive processing techniques to produce rolls of product in an efficient and cost-effective way due to its high production rate and mass quantity. Therefore, the R2R processes have been increasingly implemented in a wide range of manufacturing industries, including traditional paper/fabric production, plastic and metal foil manufacturing, flexible electronics, thin film batteries, photovoltaics, graphene films production, etc. However, the increasing complexity of R2R processes and high demands on product quality have heightened the needs for effective real-time process monitoring and fault diagnosis in R2R manufacturing systems. This dissertation aims at developing tools to increase system visibility without additional sensors, in order to enhance real-time monitoring, and fault diagnosis capability in R2R manufacturing systems. First, a multistage modeling method is proposed for process monitoring and quality estimation in R2R processes. Product-centric and process-centric variation propagation are introduced to characterize variation propagation throughout the system. The multistage model mainly focuses on the formulation of process-centric variation propagation, which uniquely exists in R2R processes, and the corresponding product quality measurements with both physical knowledge and sensor data analysis. Second, a nonlinear analytical redundancy method is proposed for sensor validation to ensure the accuracy of sensor measurements for process and quality control. Parity relations based on nonlinear observation matrix are formulated to characterize system dynamics and sensor measurements. Robust optimization is designed to identify the coefficient of parity relations that can tolerate a certain level of measurement noise and system disturbances. The effect of the change of operating conditions on the value of the optimal objective function – parity residuals and the optimal design variables – parity coefficients are evaluated with sensitivity analysis. Finally, a multiple model approach for anomaly detection and fault diagnosis is introduced to improve the diagnosability under different operating regimes. The growing structure multiple model system (GSMMS) is employed, which utilizes Voronoi sets to automatically partition the entire operating space into smaller operating regimes. The local model identification problem is revised by formulating it into an optimization problem based on the loss minimization framework and solving with the mini-batch stochastic gradient descent method instead of least squares algorithms. This revision to the GSMMS method expands its capability to handle the local model identification problems that cannot be solved with a closed-form solution. The effectiveness of the models and methods are determined with testbed data from an R2R process. The results show that those proposed models and methods are effective tools to understand variation propagation in R2R processes and improve estimation accuracy of product quality by 70%, identify the health status of sensors promptly to guarantee data accuracy for modeling and decision making, and reduce false alarm rate and increase detection power under different operating conditions. Eventually, those tools developed in this thesis contribute to increase the visibility of R2R manufacturing systems, improve productivity and reduce product rejection rate.PHDMechanical EngineeringUniversity of Michigan, Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studieshttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/146114/1/huanyis_1.pd

Predictive Maintenance on the Machining Process and Machine Tool

This paper presents the process required to implement a data driven Predictive Maintenance (PdM) not only in the machine decision making, but also in data acquisition and processing. A short review of the different approaches and techniques in maintenance is given. The main contribution of this paper is a solution for the predictive maintenance problem in a real machining process. Several steps are needed to reach the solution, which are carefully explained. The obtained results show that the Preventive Maintenance (PM), which was carried out in a real machining process, could be changed into a PdM approach. A decision making application was developed to provide a visual analysis of the Remaining Useful Life (RUL) of the machining tool. This work is a proof of concept of the methodology presented in one process, but replicable for most of the process for serial productions of pieces

Machine Learning in Wireless Sensor Networks: Algorithms, Strategies, and Applications

Wireless sensor networks monitor dynamic environments that change rapidly over time. This dynamic behavior is either caused by external factors or initiated by the system designers themselves. To adapt to such conditions, sensor networks often adopt machine learning techniques to eliminate the need for unnecessary redesign. Machine learning also inspires many practical solutions that maximize resource utilization and prolong the lifespan of the network. In this paper, we present an extensive literature review over the period 2002-2013 of machine learning methods that were used to address common issues in wireless sensor networks (WSNs). The advantages and disadvantages of each proposed algorithm are evaluated against the corresponding problem. We also provide a comparative guide to aid WSN designers in developing suitable machine learning solutions for their specific application challenges.Comment: Accepted for publication in IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorial

A data analytics approach to gas turbine prognostics and health management

As a consequence of the recent deregulation in the electrical power production industry, there has been a shift in the traditional ownership of power plants and the way they are operated. To hedge their business risks, the many new private entrepreneurs enter into long-term service agreement (LTSA) with third parties for their operation and maintenance activities. As the major LTSA providers, original equipment manufacturers have invested huge amounts of money to develop preventive maintenance strategies to minimize the occurrence of costly unplanned outages resulting from failures of the equipments covered under LTSA contracts. As a matter of fact, a recent study by the Electric Power Research Institute estimates the cost benefit of preventing a failure of a General Electric 7FA or 9FA technology compressor at $10 to$20 million. Therefore, in this dissertation, a two-phase data analytics approach is proposed to use the existing monitoring gas path and vibration sensors data to first develop a proactive strategy that systematically detects and validates catastrophic failure precursors so as to avoid the failure; and secondly to estimate the residual time to failure of the unhealthy items. For the first part of this work, the time-frequency technique of the wavelet packet transforms is used to de-noise the noisy sensor data. Next, the time-series signal of each sensor is decomposed to perform a multi-resolution analysis to extract its features. After that, the probabilistic principal component analysis is applied as a data fusion technique to reduce the number of the potentially correlated multi-sensors measurement into a few uncorrelated principal components. The last step of the failure precursor detection methodology, the anomaly detection decision, is in itself a multi-stage process. The obtained principal components from the data fusion step are first combined into a one-dimensional reconstructed signal representing the overall health assessment of the monitored systems. Then, two damage indicators of the reconstructed signal are defined and monitored for defect using a statistical process control approach. Finally, the Bayesian evaluation method for hypothesis testing is applied to a computed threshold to test for deviations from the healthy band. To model the residual time to failure, the anomaly severity index and the anomaly duration index are defined as defects characteristics. Two modeling techniques are investigated for the prognostication of the survival time after an anomaly is detected: the deterministic regression approach, and parametric approximation of the non-parametric Kaplan-Meier plot estimator. It is established that the deterministic regression provides poor prediction estimation. The non parametric survival data analysis technique of the Kaplan-Meier estimator provides the empirical survivor function of the data set comprised of both non-censored and right censored data. Though powerful because no a-priori predefined lifetime distribution is made, the Kaplan-Meier result lacks the flexibility to be transplanted to other units of a given fleet. The parametric analysis of survival data is performed with two popular failure analysis distributions: the exponential distribution and the Weibull distribution. The conclusion from the parametric analysis of the Kaplan-Meier plot is that the larger the data set, the more accurate is the prognostication ability of the residual time to failure model.PhDCommittee Chair: Mavris, Dimitri; Committee Member: Jiang, Xiaomo; Committee Member: Kumar, Virendra; Committee Member: Saleh, Joseph; Committee Member: Vittal, Sameer; Committee Member: Volovoi, Vital

Merging Data Sources to Predict Remaining Useful Life – An Automated Method to Identify Prognostic Parameters

The ultimate goal of most prognostic systems is accurate prediction of the remaining useful life (RUL) of individual systems or components based on their use and performance. This class of prognostic algorithms is termed Degradation-Based, or Type III Prognostics. As equipment degrades, measured parameters of the system tend to change; these sensed measurements, or appropriate transformations thereof, may be used to characterize degradation. Traditionally, individual-based prognostic methods use a measure of degradation to make RUL estimates. Degradation measures may include sensed measurements, such as temperature or vibration level, or inferred measurements, such as model residuals or physics-based model predictions. Often, it is beneficial to combine several measures of degradation into a single parameter. Selection of an appropriate parameter is key for making useful individual-based RUL estimates, but methods to aid in this selection are absent in the literature. This dissertation introduces a set of metrics which characterize the suitability of a prognostic parameter. Parameter features such as trendability, monotonicity, and prognosability can be used to compare candidate prognostic parameters to determine which is most useful for individual-based prognosis. Trendability indicates the degree to which the parameters of a population of systems have the same underlying shape. Monotonicity characterizes the underlying positive or negative trend of the parameter. Finally, prognosability gives a measure of the variance in the critical failure value of a population of systems. By quantifying these features for a given parameter, the metrics can be used with any traditional optimization technique, such as Genetic Algorithms, to identify the optimal parameter for a given system. An appropriate parameter may be used with a General Path Model (GPM) approach to make RUL estimates for specific systems or components. A dynamic Bayesian updating methodology is introduced to incorporate prior information in the GPM methodology. The proposed methods are illustrated with two applications: first, to the simulated turbofan engine data provided in the 2008 Prognostics and Health Management Conference Prognostics Challenge and, second, to data collected in a laboratory milling equipment wear experiment. The automated system was shown to identify appropriate parameters in both situations and facilitate Type III prognostic model development

Optimized state estimation for nonlinear dynamical networks subject to fading measurements and stochastic coupling strength: An event-triggered communication mechanism

summary:This paper is concerned with the design of event-based state estimation algorithm for nonlinear complex networks with fading measurements and stochastic coupling strength. The event-based communication protocol is employed to save energy and enhance the network transmission efficiency, where the changeable event-triggered threshold is adopted to adjust the data transmission frequency. The phenomenon of fading measurements is described by a series of random variables obeying certain probability distribution. The aim of the paper is to propose a new recursive event-based state estimation strategy such that, for the admissible linearization error, fading measurements and stochastic coupling strength, a minimum upper bound of estimation error covariance is given by designing the estimator gain. Furthermore, the monotonicity relationship between the trace of the upper bound of estimation error covariance and the fading probability is pointed out from the theoretical aspect. Finally, a simulation example is used to show the effectiveness of developed state estimation algorithm

The latent state hazard model, with application to wind turbine reliability

We present a new model for reliability analysis that is able to distinguish the latent internal vulnerability state of the equipment from the vulnerability caused by temporary external sources. Consider a wind farm where each turbine is running under the external effects of temperature, wind speed and direction, etc. The turbine might fail because of the external effects of a spike in temperature. If it does not fail during the temperature spike, it could still fail due to internal degradation, and the spike could cause (or be an indication of) this degradation. The ability to identify the underlying latent state can help better understand the effects of external sources and thus lead to more robust decision-making. We present an experimental study using SCADA sensor measurements from wind turbines in Italy.Comment: Published at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/15-AOAS859 in the Annals of Applied Statistics (http://www.imstat.org/aoas/) by the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org

Multi-sensor multi-rate fusion estimation for networked systems: Advances and perspectives

National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grants 62103095, 61873058, 61873148 and 61933007; AHPU Youth Top-notch Talent Support Program of China under Grant 2018BJRC009; Natural Science Foundation of Anhui Province of China under Grant 2108085MA07; Royal Society of the UK; Alexander von Humboldt Foundation of Germany

Heterogeneous Sensor Signal Processing for Inference with Nonlinear Dependence

Inferring events of interest by fusing data from multiple heterogeneous sources has been an interesting and important topic in recent years. Several issues related to inference using heterogeneous data with complex and nonlinear dependence are investigated in this dissertation. We apply copula theory to characterize the dependence among heterogeneous data. In centralized detection, where sensor observations are available at the fusion center (FC), we study copula-based fusion. We design detection algorithms based on sample-wise copula selection and mixture of copulas model in different scenarios of the true dependence. The proposed approaches are theoretically justified and perform well when applied to fuse acoustic and seismic sensor data for personnel detection. Besides traditional sensors, the access to the massive amount of social media data provides a unique opportunity for extracting information about unfolding events. We further study how sensor networks and social media complement each other in facilitating the data-to-decision making process. We propose a copula-based joint characterization of multiple dependent time series from sensors and social media. As a proof-of-concept, this model is applied to the fusion of Google Trends (GT) data and stock/flu data for prediction, where the stock/flu data serves as a surrogate for sensor data. In energy constrained networks, local observations are compressed before they are transmitted to the FC. In these cases, conditional dependence and heterogeneity complicate the system design particularly. We consider the classification of discrete random signals in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs), where, for communication efficiency, only local decisions are transmitted. We derive the necessary conditions for the optimal decision rules at the sensors and the FC by introducing a hidden random variable. An iterative algorithm is designed to search for the optimal decision rules. Its convergence and asymptotical optimality are also proved. The performance of the proposed scheme is illustrated for the distributed Automatic Modulation Classification (AMC) problem. Censoring is another communication efficient strategy, in which sensors transmit only informative observations to the FC, and censor those deemed uninformative . We design the detectors that take into account the spatial dependence among observations. Fusion rules for censored data are proposed with continuous and discrete local messages, respectively. Their computationally efficient counterparts based on the key idea of injecting controlled noise at the FC before fusion are also investigated. In this thesis, with heterogeneous and dependent sensor observations, we consider not only inference in parallel frameworks but also the problem of collaborative inference where collaboration exists among local sensors. Each sensor forms coalition with other sensors and shares information within the coalition, to maximize its inference performance. The collaboration strategy is investigated under a communication constraint. To characterize the influence of inter-sensor dependence on inference performance and thus collaboration strategy, we quantify the gain and loss in forming a coalition by introducing the copula-based definitions of diversity gain and redundancy loss for both estimation and detection problems. A coalition formation game is proposed for the distributed inference problem, through which the information contained in the inter-sensor dependence is fully explored and utilized for improved inference performance

Protocol-Based Tobit Kalman Filter under Integral Measurements and Probabilistic Sensor Failures

This paper is concerned with the Tobit Kalman filtering problem for a class of discrete time-varying systems subject to censored observations, integral measurements and probabilistic sensor failures under the Round-Robin protocol (RRP). The censored observations are characterized by the Tobit observation model, the integral measurements are described as functions of system states over a certain time interval required for data acquisition, and the sensor failures are governed by a set of uncorrelated random variables. The RRP is employed to decide the transmission sequence of sensors in order to alleviate undesirable data collisions. By resorting to the augmentation technique and the orthogonality projection principle, a protocol-based Tobit Kalman filter (TKF) is developed with the coexistence of integral measurements and sensor failures that lead to a couple of augmentation-induced terms. Moreover, the performance of the proposed filter is analyzed through examining the statistical property of the error covariance of the state estimation. Further analysis shows the existence of self-propagating upper and lower bounds on the estimation error covariance. A case study on ballistic roll rate estimation is presented to illustrate the efficacy of the developed filter.10.13039/501100001809-National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Number: 61803074, 61703245, U2030205, 61903065, 61671109, U1830207 and U1830133); 10.13039/501100002858-China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (Grant Number: 2018T110702, 2018M643441, 2017M623005 and 2015M5825); Royal Society of the U.K.; Alexander von Humboldt Foundation of Germany