Virtual engine maintenance

Vicon's Motion Capture technology employs sensor-equipped cameras along with data gloves and a head-mounted display to model a technician's movements during simulated maintenance activities.

To improve aircraft engine maintenance, Pratt & Whitney has begun using a virtual modeling tool developed by Vicon. Called Vicon Motion Capture, the tool is a key component within the 3-D, virtual reality-driven environment Pratt & Whitney has assembled to help evaluate time-and-task requirements for engine repair without building physical prototypes. The virtual program, which enables interaction of human engineers directly with digital CAD engine models, is in concept demonstration as part of the engine maker's $4.8 billion system development and demonstration contract for the F-135 propulsion system, which will be used to power the Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (JSF).

Modeling and simulations are conducted in a 20- x 20-ft area equipped with eight Vicon sensor-equipped cameras. Pratt & Whitney's simulation program encompasses virtual maintenance rehearsals in which an engineer wearing data gloves and a Vicon head-mounted display performs repair-related tasks on CAD engine models. In this digital aircraft hangar, the immersed person performs an exercise—reaching for a particular engine part, or pulling out a plug to drain the oil, for example—while a review board studies a projection of the action. The review board documents any problem-points, checking each move for its feasibility, complexity, and completion time.

"Using the Vicon system with our existing 3-D CAD models allows us to identify and correct any issues more quickly and for less cost than with physical models and mockups," said Tom Farmer, Vice President of F-135 engine programs at Pratt & Whitney. "Our F-135 propulsion system must be able to integrate flawlessly across a distributed design and development team with all three JSF variants. This is a critical requirement, and we expect the use of the Vicon motion data system to significantly benefit the integration of the F-135 propulsion system into the F-35 aircraft."

Pratt & Whitney is using Vicon's Motion Capture technology to determine time-and-task requirements for engine repair.

The Vicon technology offers the ability to use a real engineer's movement, translate this into the virtual reality space in real time, and significantly improve depth perception and the feeling of submersion in the simulation. Prior to its implementation at Pratt & Whitney, simulation technicians had to input every digital human action via a keyboard and mouse.

Pratt & Whitney's virtual maintenance capability was developed in collaboration with systems integrator and virtual reality designer VRSim, Inc. of New Britain, CT. VRSim used World Toolkit in conjunction with its proprietary software and methodology to perform the integration of CAD files into a real-time simulation. VRSim also created custom drivers to enable the Vicon system to interact with the various virtual reality software programs to perform the complex movements and interactions.

- Frank Bokulich