A review of electro-hydraulic servovalve research and development

This paper provides a review of the state of the art of electro-hydraulic servovalves, which are widely used valves in industrial applications and aerospace, being key components for closed loop electrohydraulic motion control systems. The paper discusses their operating principles and the analytical models used to study these valves. Commercially available units are also analysed in detail, reporting the performance levels achieved by current servovalves in addition to discussing their advantages and drawbacks. Adetailed analysis of research that investigates these valves via computational fluid dynamic analysis is also provided. Research studies on novel control systems and novel configurations based on the use of smart materials, which aim to improve performance or reduce cost, are also analysed in detail.</p

A review of electro-hydraulic servovalve research and development

This paper provides a review of the state of the art of electro-hydraulic servovalves, which are widely used valves in industrial applications and aerospace, being key components for closed loop electrohydraulic motion control systems. The paper discusses their operating principles and the analytical models used to study these valves. Commercially available units are also analysed in detail, reporting the performance levels achieved by current servovalves in addition to discussing their advantages and drawbacks. Adetailed analysis of research that investigates these valves via computational fluid dynamic analysis is also provided. Research studies on novel control systems and novel configurations based on the use of smart materials, which aim to improve performance or reduce cost, are also analysed in detail.</p

Improving Energy Efficiency and Motion Control in Load-Carrying Applications using Self-Contained Cylinders

Because of an increasing focus on environmental impact, including CO2 emissions and fluid spill pollution, inefficient hydraulic systems are being replaced by more environmentally friendly alternatives in several industries. For instance, in some offshore applications that have multiple diesel generators continuously running to produce electricity, all hydraulic rotating actuators supplied from a central hydraulic power unit have been replaced with AC induction motors containing a variable frequency drive and gearbox. However, hydraulic linear actuators are still needed in most load-carrying applications mainly because of their high reliability associated with external impact shocks. Moreover, their force capacity is higher than that of their linear electromechanical counterparts. Valve-controlled linear actuators (cylinders) supplied from a centralized hydraulic power unit are standard in offshore load-carrying applications. In addition to the advantages mentioned above of hydraulic linear actuators, they have, nevertheless, a number of important drawbacks, which include: 1) a high level of energy consumption due to significant power losses caused by flow throttling in both the pipelines and valves, 2) reduced motion performance due to the influence of load-holding valves, 3) high CO2 emissions and fuel costs related to the diesel generator that supplies electricity to the hydraulic power unit, 4) significant potential for hydraulic fluid leakage because of many leakage points, 5) demanding efforts with respect to installation and maintenance, as well as 6) costly piping due to the centralized hydraulic power supply. The work presented in this dissertation and the appended papers are devoted to replacing inefficient hydraulic linear actuation systems traditionally used in offshore load-carrying applications with more environmentally friendly solutions. Two alternative technologies are identified, namely electro-mechanical and electro-hydraulic self-contained cylinders. The feasibility of replacing conventional valve-controlled cylinders with self-contained cylinder concepts is investigated in two relevant case studies.publishedVersio

Intelligent Diagnostics for Aircraft Hydraulic Equipment

In aviation industry, unscheduled maintenance costs may vary in a large range depending on several factors, such as specific aircraft system, operational environment, aircraft usage and maintenance policy. These costs will become more noteworthy in the next decade, due to the positive growing of worldwide fleet and the introduction of more technologically advanced aircraft. New implemented technologies will bring new challenges in the Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul (MRO) companies, both because of the rising number of new technologies and high volume of well-established devices, such as Electro-Hydraulic Servo Actuators for primary flight control. Failures in aircraft hydraulic systems deeply influence the overall failure rate and so the relative maintenance costs. For this reason, overhaul procedures for these components still represents a profitable market share for all MRO stakeholders. Innovative solutions able to facilitate maintenance operations can lead to large cost savings. This paper proposes new methodologies and features of the Intelligent Diagnostic system which is being developed in partnership with Lufthansa Technik (LHT). The implementation of this innovative procedure is built on a set of failure detection algorithms, based on Machine Learning techniques. This development requires first to bring together the results from different parallel research activities: 1. Identification of critical components from historical data; 2. Designing and testing automatic and adaptable procedure for first faults detection; 3. High-fidelity mathematical modeling of considered test units, for deeper physics analysis of possible failures; 4. Implementation of Machine Learning reasoner, able to process experimental and simulated data

Design and Test of an Automotive Clutch Actuation

This thesis builds on the analysis of a automatic system for automotive automatic clutches. In this field of study there are some constraint to take into account and through them it is possible to find the best technological solution. The system under consideration is characterized as electromechanical, with an electric motor brush DC and reduction system very complex. The system was modeled using the Bond-Graph technique which allowed the drafting of the dynamical system equations, in state space form. In fact the system itself is quite complex due to the fact that multiple dynamic domains were taken into account. The result is a unique model where all the dynamics are represented, with constitutive equations. Three alternative solutions have been proposed to improve performance and reduce power consumption and system complexity. The prototypes were built and tested. The evaluation of the results were followed by a model parameter identificatio

Volume 2 – Conference: Wednesday, March 9

10. Internationales Fluidtechnisches Kolloquium:Group 1 | 2: Novel System Structures Group 3 | 5: Pumps Group 4: Thermal Behaviour Group 6: Industrial Hydraulic

Erosion Degradation Characteristics of a Linear Electro-Hydrostatic Actuator Under a High-Frequency Turbulent Flow Field

The paper proposes a performance degradation analysis model based on dynamic erosion wear for a novel Linear Electro-Hydrostatic Actuator (LEHA). Rather than the traditional statistical methods based on degradation data, the method proposed in this paper firstly analyzes the dominant progressive failure mode of the LEHA based on the working principle and working conditions of the LEHA. The Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) method, combining the turbulent theory and the micro erosion principle, is used to establish an erosion model of the rectification mechanism. The erosion rates for different port openings, under a time-varying flow field, are obtained. The piecewise linearization method is applied to update the concentration of contaminated particles within the LEHA, in order to gain insight into the erosion degradation process at various stages of degradation. The main contribution of the proposed model is the application of the dynamic concentration of contamination particles in erosion analysis of Electro-Hydraulic Servo Valves (EHSVs), throttle valves, spool valves, and needle valves. The effects of system parameters and working conditions on component wear are analyzed by simulations. The results of the proposed model match the expected degradation process. (C) 2017 Production and hosting by Elsevier Ltd. on behalf of Chinese Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics

The Working Hydraulics of Valve-Controlled Mobile Machines: Classification and Review

Productivity, reliability, controllability, flexibility and affordable costs represent key aspects in mobile machines. Additionally, due to the high fuel price and to the introduction of stringent emission regulations for diesel engines, the reduction of fuel consumption while persevering the existing performance is the current demand. In order to satisfy and maximize the above requirements, different hydraulic system architectures have been developed during the last decades. Both academia and industry have been investing considerable resources delivering numerous outcomes that require a classification. This review paper closes this gap by analyzing and classifying the working hydraulics of non-hybrid, valve-controlled mobile machines starting from the 1980s to the state-of-the-art. Hydraulic layouts are addressed and categorized by both discussing their fundamentals and evolutions, and by pointing out their pros and cons in a way to provide the readers with a comprehensive overview of the systems currently available on the market and at the research stage

An Active Disturbance Rejection Control Solution for Electro-Hydraulic Servo Systems

The intriguing history of disturbance cancellation control is reviewed in this thesis first, which demonstrates that this unique control concept is both reasonable and practical. One novel form of disturbance cancellation, ADRC (Active Disturbance Rejection Control), attracts much attention because of its good disturbance rejection ability and simplicity in implementation. Hydraulic systems tend to have many disturbances and model uncertainties, giving us a great motivation to find out a good control method. In this thesis, electro-hydraulic servo control problem is reformulated to focus on the core problem of disturbance rejection. An ADRC solution is developed and evaluated against the industry standard solution, with promising result

A fault-tolerant triple-redundant voice coil motor for direct drive valves: Design, optimization, and experiment

AbstractA direct drive actuator (DDA) with direct drive valves (DDVs) as the control device is an ideal solution for a flight actuation system. This paper presents a novel triple-redundant voice coil motor (TRVCM) used for redundant DDVs. The TRVCM features electrical/mechanical hybrid triple-redundancy by securing three stators along with three moving coils in the same frame. A permanent magnet (PM) Halbach array is employed in each redundant VCM to simplify the system structure. A back-to-back design between neighborly redundancies is adopted to decouple the magnetic flux linkage. The particle swarm optimization (PSO) method is implemented to optimize design parameters based on the analytical magnetic circuit model. The optimization objective function is defined as the acceleration capacity of the motor to achieve high dynamic performance. The optimal geometric parameters are verified with 3D magnetic field finite element analysis (FEA). A research prototype has been developed for experimental purpose. The experimental results of magnetic field density and force output show that the proposed TRVCM has great potential of applications in DDA systems