News Archive
1 June 2005: HGL wins new order for test-bed digital acquisition and safety monitoring systems
HGL Dynamics has won a contract to provide an additional 32-channel Hawk acquisition system with two Hawkeye twin-screen real-time safety monitoring systems and a Tornado analysis server to a major industrial gas turbine manufacturer in the UK. Acquired data files are automatically analysed according to predefined requests submitted from client workstations.
This new system plugs directly into the existing dynamic data network supplied by HGL under a previous contract, providing acquired data files to a central Hercules mass storage system.
1 June 2005: Aerospace Testing Expo 2005 moves to the USA!
If you missed us at the show in Hamburg earlier this year, don't worry - you have a second chance. The Aerospace Testing Expo show is also taking place in Long Beach, California from the 8th to the 10th of November 2005.
For more information on the show please follow this link - and we'll hope to see you there!
2 May 2005: HGL wins new order for an advanced data transfer facility
HGL Dynamics has won a contract to provide an automatic data transfer facility from an external archive into an existing dynamic analysis system at a major UK-based gas turbine engine manufacturer.
As a result of the specialised features of the analysis facility, and due to the data transfer rates anticipated by the customer, HGL was found to be the only company which could provide a robust solution in the required timeframe.
This transfer capability has been successfully tested and demonstrated, transferring files automatically over a Gigabit Ethernet link at sustained rates of 60 - 70 MB/s.
21 March 2005: Visit HGL at Aerospace Testing Expo
HGL Dynamics will be exhibiting at the Aerospace Testing Expo, Hamburg, 5-7 April. Find us demonstrating our range of products at stand 2U/C7. You are welcome to come and chat with our engineers, who can help with many aspects of dynamic data acquisition, monitoring and analysis.
For more information follow this link: Aerospace Testing Expo 2005 EUROPE.
21 March 2005: HGL provides high-speed acquisition hire for industrial gas turbine development
HGL Dynamics is working with a major industrial gas turbine manufacturer in the UK to provide a multi-channel, high-speed data acquisition system as part of a unique test requirement. Up to 24 channels of data are connected to a distributed HAWK system, with simultaneous sampling across all channels at up to 1 MHz sample rate per channel.
This test setup has been configured in a short timescale to meet the test requirements by taking standard hardware and software off the shelf, and altering the choice of acquisition cards to provide the increased sample rate. The only other change to our standard systems has been the development of a file format conversion utility to export data in a special format specified by the customer.
17 March 2005: HGL commissions a new dynamics system for gas turbine production testing
HGL Dynamics is pleased to announce that, as a part of a test facility upgrade for an industrial gas turbine manufacturer in the UK, a 32-channel HAWK system has been installed and commissioned. The system will provide vibration and pressure monitoring, recording and analysis facilities for production pass-off tests.
The acquisition system has network links to a centralised analysis and storage facility, also provided by HGL, for dynamics analysts to interrogate the acquired data from multiple test beds. As with all our Hercules archive systems, the format of the data recorded on digital tape allows for rapid transfer of data from one site to another, with automatic uploading of file details on tape into the new site database.
14 March 2005: Instrumentation Consultant joins HGL
Alan March has joined HGL Dynamics in the role of Instrumentation Consultant. Alan, who comes to HGL from Rolls Royce, is an Engineer with considerable experience in instrumentation and data acquisition in the aerospace industry. He has worked supporting Rolls Royce partners and customers worldwide and will be an asset to HGL's product development and customer support teams.
10 March 2005: HGL wins contract for systems upgrade at major aero engine facility in UK
HGL has won a contract for $150,000 to provide an upgraded data download and translation facility for a major civil aero engine manufacturer in the UK. This new facility will extend the current dynamic data analysis system by being able to acquire data from up to six test cells simultaneously, in a mixture of formats including analogue data channels and multiplexed telemetry systems.
This new capability will be integrated into the existing dynamic analysis system, also supplied by HGL. The existing system has been providing improvements in analysis techniques, data throughput, and reductions in time and cost for conducting engine certification, for several years.
This expansion to the existing system demonstrates our customer's satisfaction with the technology and capabilities provided by HGL Dynamics.
10 March 2005: HGL wins contract for systems upgrade at major aero engine facility in USA
HGL has won a contract for $150,000 to provide an upgraded data acquisition and analysis facility for a major aero engine manufacturer in the USA. This facility will provide simultaneous acquisition of 128 channels at up to 200 kHz per channel.
The upgraded system is distributed over several computers linked by network, providing improved processing power for real-time safety monitoring on all acquired channels, as well as faster generation of analysis files.
9 February 2005: HGL commissions HAWK system for UK aero engine manufacturer
HGL Dynamics has now commissioned a third HAWK system for a major military jet engine manufacturer in the UK. This system will provide dynamic data acquisition, monitoring and analysis for development testing of military gas turbines.
The system provides real-time safety monitoring for engine component protection, and sophisticated live analysis displays which may be configured and adjusted by the user, either before the test or during live capture.
Data files recorded by the system are automatically transferred via network to an analysis and archive system previously supplied by HGL. This system is capable of generating analysed results files on an automatic basis from incoming data files arriving from the test beds. The results files are accessible to data analysts at their desktops over the network. All raw acquired files and analysed results files are automatically copied onto digital tape for long-term storage.
21 October 2004: HGL achieves ISO 9001 accreditation
HGL Dynamics is pleased to announce that, as a part of its policy to provide the best both in service and sales, the company has secured the internationally recognized trading standard for quality EN ISO 9001:2000.
Attaining this certification has been an objective of the company for some time, and this recognition highlights the commitment made by all our staff to developing, implementing, and following an effective management system.
2 July 2004: HGL moves to new, larger premises
As HGL has continued to expand recently, we've run out of space in our current office - so we're moving to a bigger building.
We have taken on several new staff members during the last few months (including two PhDs with expertise in numerical analysis and engineering measurement techniques for gas turbine engine testing). With the extra staff numbers, combined with the additional in-house test equipment which has been procured to simulate the increased channel requirements of recent jobs, HGL needed to find more floor space.
Our new address is:
The Old Print House
Bridge Mews
Godalming
Surrey
GU7 1HZ
2 June 2004: HawkEye real-time safety monitoring improved for F136 testing
The HawkEye real-time display and safety monitoring system has been enhanced as part of HGL's involvement in the F136 engine test program starting in July 2004 at GE's Evendale plant in Ohio. The display update rate on each monitor screen has been improved so that operators can see smoothly updating displays on as many monitors as are desired.
Furthermore, the safety monitoring capabilities of the HawkEye system make it easy to identify which modes or engine orders are exceeding their limits in an intuitive graphical form, providing instant feedback to the operators if a problem should occur.
9 April 2004: Pioneer product introduced at Aero Test Expo 2004
HGL's new product for summarising peak values and generating reports was demonstrated last week at the Aero Test Expo show in Hamburg, Germany. This new product is centred on a database of peak levels which may be accessed by multiple users from their desktops.
24 October 2003: Campbell / Zmod plots support angled lines as well as colour
The colour (or greyscale) images traditionally displayed in the DataViewer and HawkEye products have used colour to indicate amplitude levels at each point in the spectral ensemble.
The DataViewer has been enhanced to permit the use of lines instead of (or as well as) colour to indicate amplitude. The lines may be vertical, fixed at 45 degrees, or users may define sets of angles which vary with amplitude to ensure that high amplitude peaks do not obscure lower amplitude peaks nearby.
26 September 2003: Real-time safety monitoring improvements
The safety monitoring features of the HawkEye real-time display system have been improved through the introduction of the "unexpected feature" capability.
This means that, in addition to permitting up to 32 user-defined features (such as modes, frequencies, or engine orders) to be tracked in real-time with alarm limits set for each feature, the HawkEye can also apply an overall alarm limit to any peak which falls outside of those user-defined features.
28 July 2003: 128-channel acquisition and analysis system enhancing engine test program
HGL Dynamics technology is being used to reduce the testing time on a major component for the Joint Strike Fighter program. A 128-channel system is installed at the test site in the USA for acquiring data from the entire test schedule.
Post-acquisition analysis leads to the peak stresses being identified and assessed within minutes of the test rig being stopped, and on some occasions the results have been obtained whilst the rig is still running and acquisition has continued.
This has allowed details of the daily test schedule to be refined once the day's running has already started, based on the results from earlier periods of the same run.
14 March 2003: Real-time scrolling Campbell / Zmod plots
The HawkEye real-time data monitoring application now supports multiple screens of scrolling colour Campbell / Zmod plots in real time. Users can view any channel on any screen, and can vary the colour "gain" to highlight the features of interest. Cursor interrogation is possible on each plot, with up to ten "sticky" pop-up notes per plot, each of which shows the current amplitude and frequency of the point under the sticky note, together with the shaft speed and engine order value for all configured shafts.
