Tracking Jet Engines

Fighter jets fly a wide variety of missions, and the level of wear on individual engine parts depends upon the types of missions flown. To more accurately predict an engine part’s life consumption, designers at Volvo Aero in Trollhåttan, Sweden, began collecting data — including time, speed, temperature, pressure and other engine part conditions — about 10 years ago to determine how engine part wear relates to mission conditions. By combining this information with data from current missions and analyzing it using ANSYS structural mechanics software, some proprietary in-house and commercial tools, and a cluster of computers, Volvo Aero is now able to accurately predict when each part in a particular jet engine needs to be replaced or serviced. Using this system, service technicians at external customer organizations can save time, reduce costs and improve safety by treating each engine based on its own unique history.