How Cegelec IMCS is contributing to the European space adventure
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VINCI Energies supports a number of players in the space sector. One of these is Ariane Group, for which Cegelec IMCS is designing and manufacturing test benches for the latest Ariane rocket engines.
A subsidiary of VINCI Energies, Cegelec IMCS (Industrial Measures & Control Systems) is a business unit specialised in designing and building real-time test benches for the space industry, including since 2009 with DLR (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft-und Raumfahrt), the German national space agency, and since early 2011, with Ariane Group, the European leader in space launchers.
Operating from their dedicated sites – in Lampoldshausen, located between Frankfurt and Stuttgart in Germany, and Vernon, in Normandy, France – one of the key missions for these two leaders in the European space industry is to design, build and operate test benches for space vehicle engines on behalf of the European Space Agency (ESA).
These are complex and highly technical operations. As Raphael Van Den Bogaert, Business Unit Manager at IMCS, explains, “An engine test is performed in three stages, beginning with simulated test programmes, followed by a test lasting around 10 minutes, and then reconditioning the test bench and processing the results.”
A command every 5 to 10 milliseconds
Numerous extremely precise tasks are to be accomplished during this test process: capturing and archiving digital and analogue signals, verifying the fluid and engine installations, retrieving the captured data and the processing output, and retrieving and analysing the archived data.
The entire launch phase is fully automated, because the commands have to be sent with speed and precision beyond the abilities of a human being. The computer sends a command every 5 to 10 milliseconds, the valves close at 100‑millisecond intervals, and around 60 engine parameters (temperatures, pressures, vibration, etc.) must be constantly monitored, along with several dozen parameters relating to the test bench itself.
“A measurement and command system designed for the rollout of critical real-time testing applications”
“To perform all these operations,” says the business unit manager, “Cegelec IMCS developed a measurement and command system, the MCS2000, tailored specifically to the rollout of critical real-time testing applications. The MCS2000 is based on three major components: Cogito – engineering software that flexibly and ergonomically defines all the hardware and software components in the test system, and its application; RNM – a real-time object-oriented kernel; and data management and human-machine interface services.”
Future Ariane engines on the test bench
This kind of testing is not lacking in challenges. Not least of these is obtaining a reliable and extremely fast real-time test bench. “The reliability of the tools we provided is not only important for the data analysis, but also for safety reasons, because an error could cause the test engine and test bench to explode,” says Raphael Van Den Bogaert.
Thanks in large part to its experience in this field, Cegelec IMCS recently secured a contract with Ariane Group for the complete renovation of the measurement and control IT system on the test benches for two rocket engines.
As part of that contract, Cegelec IMCS is providing the Ariane Group with SCADA systems – real-time control and data acquisition systems that allow large-scale remote management of a huge number of measurements and remote control of technical installations.
12/12/2024
