A health monitoring modelling case study: humidity effects on engine deterioration prediction

This work focuses on humidity effects of turbofan engines, in order to identify the magnitude of the error in operational conditions and the implications on maintenance decision support. More specifically, this paper employs a set of different methods, including semi-empirical corrections used in engine test beds, performance simulation models and analysis of historical data, in order to investigate the effects of humidity. We show that varying humidity can have a noticeable influence on the performance of the engine. These discrepancies cannot be currently quantified by health monitoring systems. Simulation and test bed correlations indicate a decrease of EGT of 0.35% per 1wt% of absolute humidity, which varies worldwide between 0 and 3wt%. Consequently, deviations in EGTM can be up to 1%, a figure which can be up to 12K for a modern civil turbofan. In practice, variations in ambient humidity have the potential to conceal possible deterioration in engine components. Following, the flight historical data were corresponded to historical humidity data. The two methods were identified to provide comparable results, indicating a higher EGTM for increasing ambient humidity. Overall, it was concluded that EGTM corrections for ambient humidity is an area of significant interest, especially for newer engine types where accurate diagnostics are of increasing importance.