Candent Technologies is proposing to continue the development of its Phase I design of an advanced technology, electric driven air compressor for an aircraft Active Flow Control (AFC) system. The Candent Team, utilizing its extensive turbomachinery design and development experience, along with their Academic partner, who used their expertise and state of the art technology to design the electrical drive system, has completed an in-depth, extensive preliminary design that can meet all the program requirements. In the Phase II program, the Candent Team will finalize the system design, fabricate prototypes, conduct development testing to verify, validate, and refine the final system design, while advancing the technology to at least a TRL5/6 level.
Benefit: The high efficiency of the compressor and the electric motor/controller will minimize the power required to drive the system, and that will in turn minimize the power draw from the aircrafts electric system, which is powered either by the engine and or the auxiliary power unit (APU). In addition, the applied technology will result in a smaller and more compact unit, which is critical since space is at a premium in most aircraft, and added weight is detrimental to payload capability. The robust, erosion resistant design will make use of either barrier filter or inertial particle separator technology to minimize sand and dirt erosion damage to the compressor blades, and to prevent clogging of air cooling passages in the motor. Attention to these and other typical operational aspects will result in a more compact, reliable, robust, efficient, and maintainable system, enhancing system availability, mission readiness, and operational safety in critical flight phases, such as rotorcraft hover and fixed wing aircraft low speed operation during take-off, approach and landing.
Keywords: Compact, advanced aerodynamics, air flow control, SWaP Optimized, High efficiency, Light weight, Advanced Magnetics
