A NEURAL NETWORK BASED APPROACH TO FAULT DETECTION IN INDUSTRIAL PROCESSES

The need for automated fault detection methods has increased in line with the complexity of processing plant technology and their control systems. Fast and accurate fault detection and isolation (FDI) is essential if a controller is to be effective in a supervisory role. This thesis is concerned with developing an FDI system based upon artificial neural network techniques. The artificial neural network (ANN) is a mechanism based upon the concepts of information processing within the brain, and consequently has the ability to self adjust, or learn about a given problem domain. It can thus be utilised in currently favoured model-based FDI systems with the advantage that it can learn process dynamics by being presented examples of process input-output pairs without the need for traditional mathematically complex models. Similarly, ANNs can be taught to classify characteristics in the residual (or plant-model difference) signal without the necessity of constructing the types of filter used in more classical solutions. Initially, a class of feedforward neural network called the multilayer perceptron (MLP) is used to model mathematically simulated linear and nonlinear plants in order to demonstrate their abilities in this field, as well as investigating the consequence of parameter variation on model effectiveness and how the model can be utilised in a model-based FDI system. A principle aim of this research is to demonstrate the ability of the system to work online and in real-time on genuine industrial processes, and the plant nominated as a test bed - the Unilever Automated Freezer (UAF) - is introduced. The UAF, being a time-varying system, requires a novel system identification approach which has resulted in a number of cascaded MLPs to model the various stages in the phased startup of the process. In order to reduce model mismatch to a minimum, it was necessary to develop an effective switching mechanism between one MLP in the cascade and the next. Attempts using a rule-based switching mechanism, a simple MLP switch and an error based switching mechanism were made, before a solution incorporating a genetic algorithm and an MLP network was developed which had the capability of learning the optimum switching points. After the successful development of the model, a series of MLPs were trained to recognise the characteristics of a number of faults within the residual signals. Problems involving false alarms between certain faults were reduced by the introduction of templates - or information pertaining to when a particular fault was most evident in the residuals. The final solution consisting of an MLP Cascade model and fault isolation MLPs is essentially generic for this class of time-varying system, and the results achieved on the UAF were far superior to those of the currently used FDI system without the need for any extra sensory information. The MLP Cascade and associated switching device together with the development of an online real-time FDI system for a time-varying piece of industrial machinery, are deemed to be original contributions to knowledge.Unilever Research Colworth Laborator

Monitoring and Fault Diagnosis for Chylla-Haase Polymerization Reactor

The main objective of this research is to develop a fault detection and isolation (FDI) methodologies for Cylla-Haase polymerization reactor, and implement the developed methods to the nonlinear simulation model of the proposed reactor to evaluate the effectiveness of FDI methods. The first part of this research focus of this chapter is to understand the nonlinear dynamic behaviour of the Chylla-Haase polymerization reactor. In this part, the mathematical model of the proposed reactor is described. The Simulink model of the proposed reactor is set up using Simulink/MATLAB. The design of Simulink model is developed based on a set of ordinary differential equations that describe the dynamic behaviour of the proposed polymerization reactor. An independent radial basis function neural networks (RBFNN) are developed and employed here for an on-line diagnosis of actuator and sensor faults. In this research, a robust fault detection and isolation (FDI) scheme is developed for open-loop exothermic semi-batch polymerization reactor described by Chylla-Haase. The independent (RBFNN) is employed here when the system is subjected to system uncertainties and disturbances. Two different techniques to employ RBF neural networks are investigated. Firstly, an independent neural network is used to model the reactor dynamics and generate residuals. Secondly, an additional RBF neural network is developed as a classifier to isolate faults from the generated residuals. In the third part of this research, a robust fault detection and isolation (FDI) scheme is developed to monitor the Chylla-Haase polymerization reactor, when it is under the cascade PI control. This part is really challenging task as the controller output cannot be designed when the reactor is under closed-loop control, and the control action will correct small changes of the states caused by faults. The proposed FDI strategy employed a radial basis function neural network (RBFNN) in an independent mode to model the process dynamics, and using the weighted sum-squared prediction error as the residual. The Recursive Orthogonal Least Squares algorithm (ROLS) is employed to train the model to overcome the training difficulty of the independent mode of the network. Then, another RBFNN is used as a fault classifier to isolate faults from different features involved in the residual vector. In this research, an independent MLP neural network is implemented here to generate residuals for detection task. And another RBF is applied for isolation task performing as a classifier. The fault diagnosis scheme is developed for a Chylla-Haase reactor under open-loop and closed-loop control system. The comparison between these two neural network architectures (MPL and RBF) are shown that RBF configuration trained by (RLS) algorithm have several advantages. The first one is greater efficiency in finding optimal weights for field strength prediction in complex dynamic systems. The RBF configuration is less complex network that results in faster convergence. The training algorithms (RLs and ROLS) that used for training RBFNN in chapter (4) and (5) have proven to be efficient, which results in significant faster computer time in comparison to back-propagation one. Another fault diagnosis (FD) scheme is developed in this research for an exothermic semi-batch polymerization reactor. The scheme includes two parts: the first part is to generate residual using an extended Kalman filter (EKF), and the second part is the decision making to report fault using a standardized hypothesis of statistical tests. The FD simulation results are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method. In the lase section of this research, a robust fault diagnosis scheme for abrupt and incipient faults in nonlinear dynamic system. A general framework is developed for model-based fault detection and diagnosis using on-line approximators and adaptation/learning schemes. In this framework, neural network models constitute an important class of on-line approximators. The changes in the system dynamics due to fault are modelled as nonlinear functions of the state, while the time profile of the fault is assumed to be exponentially developing. The changes in the system dynamics are monitored by an on-line approximation model, which is used for detecting the failures. A systematic procedure for constructing nonlinear estimation algorithm is developed, and a stable learning scheme is derived using Lyapunov theory. Simulation studies are used to illustrate the results and to show the effectiveness of the fault diagnosis methodology. Finally, the success of the proposed fault diagnosis methods illustrates the potential of the application of an independent RBFNN, an independent MLP, an Extended kalman filter and an adaptive nonlinear observer based FD, to chemical reactors

Fault Detection and Isolation In Gas Turbine Engines

Aircraft engines are complex systems that require high reliability and adequate monitoring to ensure flight safety and performance. Moreover, timely maintenance has necessitated the need for intelligent capabilities and functionalities for detection and diagnosis of anomalies and faults. In this thesis, fault diagnosis in aircraft jet engines is investigated by using intelligent-based methodologies. Two different artificial neural network schemes are introduced for this purpose. The first fault detection and isolation (FDI) scheme for an aircraft jet engine is based on the multiple model approach and utilizes dynamic neural networks (DNN). Towards this end, multiple DNNs are constructed to learn the nonlinear dynamics of the aircraft jet engine. Each DNN represents a specific operating mode of the healthy or the faulty conditions of the jet engine. The inherent challenges in fault diagnosis systems is that their performance could be excessively reduced under sensor fault and sensor degradation conditions (such as drift and noise). This thesis proposes the use of data validation and sensor fault detection to improve the performance of the overall fault diagnosis system. In this regard the concept of nonlinear principle components analysis (NPCA) is exploited by using autoassociative neural networks. The second FDI scheme is developed by using autoassociative neural networks (ANN). A parallel bank of ANNs are proposed to diagnose sensor faults as well as component faults in the aircraft jet engine. Unlike most FDI techniques, the proposed solution simultaneously accomplishes sensor faults and component faults detection and isolation (FDI) within a unified diagnostic framework. In both proposed FDI approaches, by using the residuals that are generated from the difference between each network output and the measured jet engine output as well as selection of a proper threshold for each network, criteria are established for performing the fault diagnosis of the jet engines. The fault diagnosis tasks consists of determining the time as well as the location of a fault occurrence subject to the presence of disturbances and measurement noise. Simulation results presented, demonstrate and illustrate the effective performance of our proposed neural network-based FDI strategies

Techniques for effective virtual sensor development and implementation with application to air data systems

1noL'abstract è presente nell'allegato / the abstract is in the attachmentopen716. INGEGNERIA AEROSPAZIALEnoopenBrandl, Albert

Neural network approach for sensor fault detection and accommodation

Master'sMASTER OF ENGINEERIN

Degradation Prognostics in Gas Turbine Engines Using Neural Networks

In complex systems such as aircraft engines, system reliability and adequate monitoring is of high priority. The performance of all physical systems degrades over time due to aging, the working and environmental conditions. Considering both time and safety, it is important to predict the system health condition in future in order to be able to assign a suitable maintenance policy. Towards this end, two artificial intelligence based methodologies are proposed and investigated in this thesis. The main objective is to predict degradation trends by studying their effects on the engine measurable parameters such as the temperature and pressure at critical points of a gas turbine engine. The first proposed prognostic scheme for the gas turbine engine is based on a recurrent neural networks (RNN) architecture. This closed-loop architecture enables the network to learn the increasing degradation dynamics using the collected data set. Training the neural networks and determining the suitable number of network parameters are challenging tasks. The other challenge associated with the prognostic problem is the uncertainty management. This is inherent in such schemes due to measurement noise and the fact that one is trying to project forward in time. To overcome this problem, upper and lower prediction bounds are defined and obtained in this thesis. The two bounds constitute a prediction band which helps one not to merely depend on the single point prediction. The prediction bands along with the prediction error statistical measures, allow one to decide on the goodness of the prediction results. The second prognostic scheme is based on a nonlinear autoregressive with exogenous input (NARX) neural networks architecture. This recurrent dynamical structure takes advantage of both features which makes it easy to manage the main objective. The network is trained with fewer examples and the prediction errors are lower as compared to the first architecture. The statistical error measures and the prediction bands are obtained for this architecture as well. In order to evaluate and compare the prediction results from the two proposed neural networks a metric known as the normalized Akaike information criterion (NAIC) is applied in this thesis. This metric takes into account the prediction error, the number of parameters used in the neural networks architecture and the number of samples in the test data set. A smaller NAIC value shows a better, more accurate and more effective prediction result. The NAIC values are found for each case and the networks are compared at the end of the thesis. Neural networks performance is based on the suitability of the data they are provided with. Two main causes of engine degradation are modelled in this thesis and a SIMULINK model is developed. Various scenarios and case studies are presented to illustrate and demonstrate the effectiveness of our proposed neural networks based prognostic approaches. The prognostic results can be employed for the engine health management purposes. This is a growing and an active area of research for the aircraft engines where only a few references exist in the literature

Fault Detection, Diagnosis and Fault Tolerance Approaches in Dynamic Systems based on Black-Box Models

In this dissertation new contributions to the research area of fault detection and diagnosis in dynamic systems are presented. The main research effort has been done on the development of new on-line model-based fault detection and diagnosis (FDD) approaches based on blackbox models (linear ARX models, and neural nonlinear ARX models). From a theoretical point of view a white-box model is more desirable to perform the FDD tasks, but in most cases it is very hard, or even impossible, to obtain. When the systems are complex, or difficult to model, modelling based on black-box models is usually a good and often the only alternative. The performance of the system identification methods plays a crucial role in the FDD methods proposed. Great research efforts have been made on the development of linear and nonlinear FDD approaches to detect and diagnose multiplicative (parametric) faults, since most of the past research work has been done focused on additive faults on sensors and actuators. The main pre-requisites for the FDD methods developed are: a) the on-line application in a real-time environment for systems under closed-loop control; b) the algorithms must be implemented in discrete time, and the plants are systems in continuous time; c) a two or three dimensional space for visualization and interpretation of the fault symptoms. An engineering and pragmatic view of FDD approaches has been followed, and some new theoretical contributions are presented in this dissertation. The fault tolerance problem and the fault tolerant control (FTC) have been investigated, and some ideas of the new FDD approaches have been incorporated in the FTC context. One of the main ideas underlying the research done in this work is to detect and diagnose faults occurring in continuous time systems via the analysis of the effect on the parameters of the discrete time black-box ARX models or associated features. In the FDD methods proposed, models for nominal operation and models for each faulty situation are constructed in off-line operation, and used a posteriori in on-line operation. The state of the art and some background concepts used for the research come from many scientific areas. The main concepts related to data mining, multivariate statistics (principal component analysis, PCA), linear and nonlinear dynamic systems, black-box models, system identification, fault detection and diagnosis (FDD), pattern recognition and discriminant analysis, and fault tolerant control (FTC), are briefly described. A sliding window version of the principal components regression algorithm, termed SW-PCR, is proposed for parameter estimation. The sliding window parameter estimation algorithms are most appropriate for fault detection and diagnosis than the recursive algorithms. For linear SISO systems, a new fault detection and diagnosis approach based on dynamic features (static gain and bandwidth) of ARX models is proposed, using a pattern classification approach based on neural nonlinear discriminant analysis (NNLDA). A new approach for fault detection (FDE) is proposed based on the application of the PCA method to the parameter space of ARX models; this allows a dimensional reduction, and the definition of thresholds based on multivariate statistics. This FDE method has been combined with a fault diagnosis (FDG) method based on an influence matrix (IMX). This combined FDD method (PCA & IMX) is suitable to deal with SISO or MIMO linear systems. Most of the research on the fault detection and diagnosis area has been done for linear systems. Few investigations exist in the FDD approaches for nonlinear systems. In this work, two new nonlinear approaches to FDD are proposed that are appropriate to SISO or MISO systems. A new architecture for a neural recurrent output predictor (NROP) is proposed, incorporating an embedded neural parallel model, an external feedback and an adjustable gain (design parameter). A new fault detection and diagnosis (FDD) approach for nonlinear systems is proposed based on a bank of neural recurrent output predictors (NROPs). Each neural NROP predictor is tuned to a specific fault. Also, a new FDD method based on the application of neural nonlinear PCA to ARX model parameters is proposed, combined with a pattern classification approach based on neural nonlinear discriminant analysis. In order to evaluate the performance of the proposed FDD methodologies, many experiments have been done using simulation models and a real setup. All the algorithms have been developed in discrete time, except the process models. The process models considered for the validation and tests of the FDD approaches are: a) a first order linear SISO system; b) a second order SISO model of a DC motor; c) a MIMO system model, the three-tank benchmark. A real nonlinear DC motor setup has also been used. A fault tolerant control (FTC) approach has been proposed to solve the typical reconfiguration problem formulated for the three-tank benchmark. This FTC approach incorporates the FDD method based on a bank of NROP predictors, and on an adaptive optimal linear quadratic Gaussian controller

Aircraft Jet Engine Health Monitoring Through System Identification Using Ensemble Neural Networks

In this thesis a new approach for jet engine Fault Detection and Isolation (FDI) is proposed using ensemble neural networks. Ensemble methods combine various model predictions to reduce the modeling error and increase the prediction accuracy. By combining individual models, more robust and accurate representations are almost always achievable without the need of ad-hoc fine tunings that are required for single model-based solutions. For the purpose of jet engine health monitoring, the model of the jet engine dynamics is represented using three different stand-alone or individual neural network learning algorithms. Specifically, a dynamic multi-layer perceptron (MLP), a dynamic radial-basis function (RBF) neural network, and a dynamic support vector machine (SVM) are trained to individually model the jet engine dynamics. The accuracy of each stand-alone model in identification of the jet engine dynamics is evaluated. Next, three ensemble-based techniques are employed to represent jet engine dynamics. Namely, two heterogenous ensemble models (an ensemble model is heterogeneous when different learning algorithms (neural networks) are used for training its members) and a homogeneous ensemble model (all the models are generated using the same learning algorithm (neural network)). It is concluded that the ensemble models improve the modeling accuracy when compared to stand-alone solutions. The best selected stand-alone model (i.e the dynamic radial-basis function neural network in this application) and the best selected ensemble model (i.e. a heterogenous ensemble) in term of the jet engine modeling accuracy are selected for performing the FDI study. Engine residual signals are generated using both single model-based and ensemble-based solutions under various engine health conditions. The obtained residuals are evaluated in order to detect engine faults. Our simulation results demonstrate that the fault detection task using residuals that are obtained from the ensemble model results in more accurate performance. The fault isolation task is performed by evaluating variations in residual signals (before and after a fault detection flag) using a neural network classifier. As in the fault detection results, it is observed that the ensemble-based fault isolation task results in a more promising performance

Fault-detection on an experimental aircraft fuel rig using a Kalman filter-based FDI screen

Reliability is an important issue across industry. This is due to a number of drivers such as the requirement of high safety levels within industries such as aviation, the need for mission success with military equipment, or to avoid monetary losses (due to unplanned outage) within the process and many other industries. The application of fault detection and identification helps to identify the presence of faults to improve mission success or increase up-time of plant equipment. Implementation of such systems can take the form of pattern recognition, statistical and geometric classifiers, soft computing methods or complex model based methods. This study deals with the latter, and focuses on a specific type of model, the Kalman filter. The Kalman filter is an observer which estimates the states of a system, i.e. the physical variables, based upon its current state and knowledge of its inputs. This relies upon the creation of a mathematical model of the system in order to predict the outputs of the system at any given time. Feedback from the plant corrects minor deviation between the system and the Kalman filter model. Comparison between this prediction of outputs and the real output provides the indication of the presence of a fault. On systems with several inputs and outputs banks of these filters can used in order to detect and isolate the various faults that occur in the process and its sensors and actuators. The thesis examines the application of the diagnostic techniques to a laboratory scale aircraft fuel system test-rig. The first stage of the research project required the development of a mathematical model of the fuel rig. Test data acquired by experiment is used to validate the system model against the fuel rig. This nonlinear model is then simplified to create several linear state space models of the fuel rig. These linear models are then used to develop the Kalman filter Fault Detection and Identification (FDI) system by application of appropriate tuning of the Kalman filter gains and careful choice of residual thresholds to determine fault condition boundaries and logic to identify the location of the fault. Additional performance enhancements are also achieved by implementation of statistical evaluation of the residual signal produced and by automatic threshold calculation. The results demonstrate the positive capture of a fault condition and identification of its location in an aircraft fuel system test-rig. The types of fault captured are hard faults such sensor malfunction and actuator failure which provide great deviation of the residual signals and softer faults such as performance degradation and fluid leaks in the tanks and pipes. Faults of a smaller magnitude are captured very well albeit within a larger time range. The performance of the Fault Diagnosis and Identification was further improved by the implementation of statistically evaluating the residual signal and by the development of automatic threshold determination. Identification of the location of the fault is managed by the use of mapping the possible fault permutations and the Kalman filter behaviour, this providing full discrimination between any faults present. Overall the Kalman filter based FDI developed provided positive results in capturing and identifying a system fault on the test-rig

Neural Network-based Fault Diagnosis of Satellites Formation Flight

The main objective of this thesis is to develop a methodology for detecting and isolating faults (i.e. fault diagnosis) in any of multiple reaction wheels that are commonly employed as actuators in a consensus-based virtual structure controlled formation of satellites. In order to accomplish this objective, a two-level fault diagnosis system is developed based on Dynamic Neural Networks (DNNs). In the lower-level of the formation flight system hierarchy, a local fault diagnosis module is available in each individual satellite. In this level, the fault diagnosis system may consist of a dynamic neural network that is trained by using absolute measurements and states of each single satellite. Unfortunately, a local fault diagnosis system may fail to detect the presence of low severity faults. In an individual satellite these low severity faults may not cause any serious complications with the specifications of the overall mission, however they can cause significant impact on the satellite’s attitude or rates in a given precision formation flight of a network of satellites. Consequently, in order to detect these low severity faults a fault detection system is required to be designed and developed at the higher-level or the formation-level of the mission hierarchy. Towards this end, the highly nonlinear dynamics of the formation flight and the reaction wheels are modeled by using dynamic multilayer perceptron neural networks. The proposed formation-level DNNs invoke the extended back propagation learning algorithm and are trained based on sets of input/output data that are collected from the relative attitude determination sensors of the 3-axis attitude control subsystems of the satellites. The DNN parameters are adjusted to minimize certain performance indices (representing the output estimation errors). The capabilities of the proposed DNNs are investigated under various faulty situations, including single and multiple actuator fault scenarios and under high severity and low severity faulty situations. Using a Confusion Matrix evaluation method, it is demonstrated that by using the proposed fault detection and isolation (FDI) scheme, one can achieve a high level of accuracy and precision in detecting faults. The proposed formation-level FDI system has capabilities in efficiently detecting and isolating actuator low severity faults simultaneously