SHORT COURSES AT COLLEGE OF AERONAUTICAL ENGINEERING

1.MATERIAL FAILURE ANALYSIS COURSE

Purpose and Background

PEC sponsored short course on Material Failure Analysis is being arranged to create an understanding on how and why materials fail and factors that contribute to such failures. It bridges a gap between theoretical concepts and their application in field. Material Failure Analysis is an important engineering function that can occur due to a variety of reasons

  • Design errors
  • Improper material
  • Improper manufacturing process
  • Unforeseen operating conditions
  • Improper maintenance

A thoroughunderstanding of Material failures can enable engineers to improve on their design, manufacturing and maintenance practices. Purpose of this course is to equip engineers with adequate understanding of this subject so that they can efficiently apply their engineering knowledge on practical cases they encounter in field / industry. With the understanding of this subject, engineers can improve their design / manufacturing and maintenance procedures to provide a better and safer product to their clients.

Learning Objectives & Benefits

This course has been designed to familiarize engineers with modern trends and techniques available for material failure analysis. In this course, in addition to metals such as Aluminum and Ferrous alloys, a substantial part has been dedicated for other advance materials such as polymers and polymer based composites. Advance concepts such as low and high cycle fatigue, thermal and residual stresses are also introduced.

The last part of the course covers modern material analysis and forensic techniques such as metallography and fractography, using modern scientific tools like Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM).

Course Breakdown

Module / Topics
1 (Composites) /
  • Composites
  • Polymers
  • Introduction
  • Characterization
  • Degradation
  • Application

2 (Materials and Heat Treatment) /
  • Micro Structure
  • Phase Diagrams
  • Heat Treatment

3 (Material Properties) /
  • Material properties
  • Stress-Strain
  • Failure / Yield Criterions

4 (Fatigue and Creep) /
  • Fatigue and Creep
  • Fractography
  • NDI Techniques

5 (Case Studies) /
  • Case Study I
  • Case Study II
  • Lab visits and demonstration

2.FATIGUE AND FRACTURE COURSE

Purpose and Background

PEC sponsored short course on Fatigue and Fracture is being arranged to understand why materials fail without any prior warning.

Fatigue in engineering components and materials refer to the initiation and development of cracks in the component, as a result of cyclic loads. There are numerous cases where a component that has been operating perfectly satisfactorily, suddenly fails catastrophically due to development and propagation of fatigue cracks. In engineering, we come across components / structures in which flaws are inevitably present and which are subject to operational stresses. Fracture mechanics analysis, coupled with appropriate inspection procedures, provides a rational and quantitative method for enabling a component to be kept in service safely, at least until a scheduled inspection or maintenance outage, when repair can be affected, with minimal loss of production. Fracture mechanics is not only a powerful tool for rational evaluation of NDT flaw indications, but is also invaluable in design, materials selection and failure analysis.

Purpose of this course is to build an understanding of this subject among engineers so that they can develop a systems and checks whereby the structural integrity of engineering systems can be assessed for their fitness.

Learning Objectives & Benefits

This course has been designed to familiarize engineering with fracture of engineering materials with special focus on fracture under fatigue loading. Theory of fracture mechanics covering stress concentration, modes of fracture, basic stress analysis, low cycle/high cycle fatigue and creep have been covered. Besides this topics like Aero-elasticity have also been touched upon. A significant portion of this course also involved experimental work involving UTM, bending fatigue testing and metallography.

Course Breakdown

Module / Topics
1 (Materials and Heat Treatment) / Micro Structure
Phase Diagrams
Heat Treatment
2 (Fracture Mechanics) / Fatigue and Creep
Failure / Yield Criterions
Aero Elasticity
Fracture Mechanics
3 (Failure Prediction and Prevention
Techniques) / Basic Stress Analysis
Stress-Strain Curves
Elements of Machine Design
Philosophy of A/C Design
NDI Techniques
5 (Fractography / Metallography) / Specimen preparation / etching
Optical microscopy
Introduction to SEM
5 (Case Studies) / Case Study I
Case Study II
Lab visits and demonstration

3.STRUCTURAL HEALTH MONITORING (SHM)

Purpose and Background

PEC sponsored short course on Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) is being conducted to familiarize engineers with latest trends in Non Destructive Evaluation (NDE) methods for monitoring and ensuring structural integrity. It has extensive application in aerospace, mechanical and civil engineering. SHM is a system with the ability to detect and interpret adverse “changes” in a structure in order to improve reliability and reduce life cycle costs.

In SHM, structures are continuously monitored during their use by embedded or attached Non Destructive Evaluation sensors. SHM is being used extensively in structural integrity and structural life enhancement programs in aviation industry.

For aircraft applications, the use of SHM technologies for future aircraft will not only enable new possibilities for maintenance concepts but will have a significant influence on design concepts and assembling technologies. SHM is expected to be one of the key technologies for controlling the structural integrity of future aircraft, providing both maintenance and weight saving benefits. Some of the advantages over conventional NDE inspection include reduced inspection down time, elimination of component tear down, and potential prevention of failure during operation. SHM is likely to be used in identifying failures in aircraft, which would also be a boon to the commercial aircraft industry.

Learning Objectives & Benefits

This course has been designed to familiarize engineering officers with modern trends and techniques available for structural health monitoring of aerospace structures. The importance of this course for PAF can be appreciated from the fact that one of the major problems faced by PAF is life cycle prediction and management of aged fleet. The main contents of this course included theory of structural analysis covering aircraft loading, low cycle/high cycle fatigue and modern computational techniques. Besides this advanced areas like use of sensors to monitor structural failures have also covered in this course.

Course Breakdown

Module / Topics
1 (SHM Familiarization) / Introduction to SHM
Aircraft Loads
SHM Techniques / Sensors
2 (Design & Formulation of SHM Techniques) / Philosophy of A/C design
Damage Tolerance Analysis
Modern Computational Techniques
3 (Aircraft Structure) / Aircraft Structural Analysis – I
Aircraft Structural Analysis – II
Aero elasticity
4 (Statistical Analysis Techniques) / QMS – Principals, Tools and Techniques
Statistical Analysis for Aircraft Structures
5 (Case Studies) / Case Study I
Case Study II
Lab visits and demonstration

4. ADVANCE DESIGN METHODS

Purpose and Background

PEC sponsored short course on Advance Design Methods is being planned to familiarize engineers with modern design methods. Due to advancement in technology and computational / simulation methods, the design process in general and aircraft design in particular have gone though a paradigm shift over the last two decades. The focus has now shifted to provide maximum freedom to the designer in later stages of design, rather than freezing a specific configuration in the earlier part of design.

Learning Objectives & Benefits

This course has been designed to familiarize engineers design process. It includes the exploration of requirements space, concept space and technology space. The design space exploration involves utilization of tools used by system engineers like design experiments, statistical regression and Monte Carlo simulations. The main emphasis is to drive the design so as to minimize uncertainty by robust design methods and probabilistic design methods. The course encompasses all these new technique and help engineers utilize these simple techniques in their routine design and analysis problems. The topics includes

  • Quality Function Deployment
  • Morphological Matrix
  • Modeling and simulation environment
  • Mission sizing and Synthesis
  • Life cycle cost estimation
  • Integrated Product and Process development
  • Statistical DoE and Multivariable regression
  • Probabilistic design methods
  • Design software and Integration environments
  • Multidisciplinary design optimization

Course Breakdown

Topics
Conventional Aircraft Design Process and Paradigm Shift
Basic Flows and Analytical Approaches
Design Space Exploration, Requirements, Concept and Technology Space
Numerical Computational Techniques
Probabilistic Design Methods
Multidisciplinary Design Optimization
Experimental Analysis Techniques and Lab Visit
Case Studies

5.AERO ENGINE PERFORMANCE COURSE

Purpose and Background

PEC sponsored short course on Aero Engine Performance is being arranged for engineers to educated them on performance parameters and performance analysis of Aero Engines.

Turbines revolutionized airplane propulsion in the 1940s, and through today have been a popular choice for shaft power delivery all over the world. Aero-engine performance deals with the thrust power delivery while ensuring stable and safe operation throughout the operational envelop. Aero-engines are mainly the gas turbine engines and gas turbine engines are also used to deliver shaft power. Thrust or shaft power is the key parameter in which every buyer and seller is interested. This course provides an equal opportunity for engineers working with air and land based gas turbines to understand the basic performance parameters such as:

  • Net thrust or power output
  • Specific thrust or power
  • Specific fuel consumption
  • Propulsive or thermal efficiency

Learning Objectives & Benefits

For performance analysis much attention is now being given to Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) however, the fundamentals do not change and this course is concerned with the basics of the subject as well as looking at new ideas.

Course Breakdown

Topics
  • Thermodynamics
  • Heat Energy and Power
  • Brayton and Jet Engine Cycles
  • Engine Controls
  • Engine Performance Parameters
  • Effects of Intake and Nozzle on
  • Engine Performance
  • Turbo-Machinery
  • Engine Maintenance
  • Engine Indications & Instrumentation
  • Engine Defects
  • Engine Acoustic and CFD
  • Design Optimization
  • Lab Visit
  • Gas Turbine Software
  • Computer Simulations

6.Radar Signal Processing

Purpose and Background

Radar systems find numerous applications in both civil and military fields. Civil applications include traffic police radars, air traffic control, weather radars, speed measurement in sports, collision avoidance, and crop cultivation. Military applications include surveillance, tracking, fire control, and imaging. Modern airborne and ground-based radars employ numerous advance digital signal processing algorithms. These DSP algorithms have greatly improved the performance, operational speed, accuracy, and flexibility of radar systems.

This short course familiarizes students with modeling and simulation of many advance radar DSP algorithms which are at the heart of any modern radar processor. The MATLAB simulations and algorithms include the radar waveform design; pulse compression technique and associated matched filtering; Moving Target Indicator (MTI) filter design and processing; Pulse-Doppler processing; design of hamming windows to control side lobes and range-Doppler coupling; Constant False Alarm Rate (CFAR) algorithms; and automated detection. The course will introduce design and processing in temporal, spatial, and frequency domains.

Learning Objectives & Benefits

The course is designed to provide a detailed coverage of modern radar DSP fundamentals and applications. It will help engineers to fill the gap between radar system theory and advanced signal processing concepts. The skills acquired in this course will serve as a basis for further advance research in the area of radar modification and development. Specifically, the course will emphasize on:

  • Radar signal acquisition and sampling in multiple domains
  • Target statistics and fluctuating models
  • Noise, and interference models
  • Design of radar waveforms and pulse compression technique
  • MTI and Pulse Doppler processing
  • Clutter and interference reduction techniques
  • Detection tools and CFAR processing

Course Breakdown:

Module / Topic / Duration
1 / Radar Basics, Block Diagram, and Subsystems / 01 Day
(08 hours)
2 / Target, Noise, and Interference Models; Data Acquisition and Sampling in Multiple Domains / 01 Day
(08 hours)
3 / Matched Filtering and Pulse Compression; MTI Filtering / 01 Day
(08 hours)
4 / Pulse Doppler Processing / 01 Day
(08 hours)
5 / Radar Detection; CFAR Processing / 01 Day
(08 hours)

7.Advanced Computing Architectures

Purpose and Background

The field of computing is one of the most rapidly changing areas of technology. In general the move has been towards parallel computing. While certain architectures like FPGAs and DSPs have matured into mainstream platforms, new architectures have emerged which have democratized parallel processing application development. In this regard, general purpose graphics hardware (GPUs) is the leading solution that has gained popularity over the last five years. These computing architectures find practical applications in almost every field of technology, some of which are listed below:

  • Signal Processing
  • Image Processing
  • Electromagnetic Simulations (Radar & Antenna)
  • CFD Simulations
  • Cloud computing
  • Databases & Information Systems

The main theme of this course runs along presenting an introduction to these emerging architectures and their applications to high performance computing challenges both in embedded and non-embedded engineering systems

Learning Objectives & Benefits

The basic idea of conducting this course is to familiarize the participants with mainstream and emerging computing architectures including FPGAs, DSPs and GPUs. Using the knowledge acquired during this course in conjunction with the applied examples and hands-on work with respective development toolkits the participants would develop a strong basis for future work.

The chief objectives of this course can be listed as:

  • To introduce modern computing architectures in embedded and non-embedded engineering systems
  • To provide examples of applications of these devices for high performance and real time computing in different domains.
  • To get hands on experience with respective development pipelines.

Course Breakdown:

Day / Topic / No. of Lectures
1 / Introduction of FPGA architecture / 2
Overview of FPGA applications and design case studies / 2
Hands-on work with an FPGA development kit / 4
2 / Introduction of DSP architecture / 2
Overview of DSP applications and design case studies / 2
Hands-on work with a DSP development kit / 4
3 / Introduction of GPU architecture / 2
Overview of GPU applications and design case studies / 2
Hands-on work with a GPU development platform / 4
Total / 24

8.Condition-Based Maintenance Course

Purpose and Background

In the recent past, the maintenance concepts have undergone a paradigm shift. Instead of replacing the components/systems when they fail or in case of exhaustion of the OEM specified life, these are replaced based on their actual condition as assessed using the sensor data. This concept has resulted in the emergence of the field of condition-based maintenance (CBM) and more recently, that of prognostics and health management (PHM). These fields are confluence of many disciplines of sciences and engineering that include:

  • Systems theory
  • Physics-of-failure (POF) study
  • Data mining
  • Pattern recognition/classification
  • Statistical learning methods such as artificial neural networks (ANNs) and support vector machines (SVMs)
  • Signal processing methods.

The main theme of this course runs along presenting an introduction to these fields and their roles in developing fault diagnostics and failure prognostics algorithms in engineering systems.

Learning Objectives & Benefits

The basic idea of conducting this course is to familiarize the participants with the field of CBM/PHM using a blend of theoretical concepts and practical results. At the conclusion of the course, the expected outcome is that participants will get a basic understanding of the various modules that form the foundation of CBM/ PHM. Using the knowledge acquired during this course in conjunction with the system specific domain-expert knowledge, they will be able to get practical benefits from this course

The chief objectives of this course can be listed as:

  • To develop a familiarization of the terminology used in the field of CBM/PHM
  • To review the theoretical basis of various field that lays the foundation of CBM/PHM
  • To understand various steps needed to develop a generic CBM system
  • To review test cases from different types of application domains

Course Breakdown:

Session / Topic / No. of Lectures
1 / Background, History, Terminology used in the field of CBM/PHM / 4
2 / Systems Theory / 2
3 / Physics of Failure Mechanism in Different Types of Systems / 3
4 / Pattern Recognition/ Classification Methods / 4
5 / Statistical Learning Methods / 5
6 / Signal Processing Techniques / 3
7 / Case Studies / 6
Problem Solving Classes / 3
Total / 30

9.Communication Networks

Purpose and Background

PEC sponsored short course on Communication Networks is being organized to teach the students about the basic concepts of communication networks with an overview of how the modern communication networks are moving towards the convergence of voice, video and data.

This course aims at providing an overview of the modern communication networks. A mix of fundamental concepts and recent technologies helps the students to learn modern Digital Communication, Networking technologies, Cellular communication, Networks & Communication Security and latest technological trends. Participants will also get an opportunity to visit the college academic network, formally known as CAN. This visit will help in enhancing the understanding developed during the course. A working model of a Voice over IP (VoIP) system will also help the students to understand the advantages of VoIP over traditional telephony.

Learning Objectives & Benefits

The desired learning objectives include the following:

  • Familiarization with the basic concepts of Digital Communication.
  • Understanding of working principles behind data communication networks including TCP/IP protocol suite, Internetworking operations, wide area networks, local area networks and wireless LANs.
  • To develop detailed understanding of Voice over IP systems.
  • To have an in-depth knowledge of Communication security with a focus on Network Security working principles.
  • To have an understanding how the actual data communication networks and VoIP systems function by the practical demonstrations and visits.

Course Breakdown: