Prognostics Design Solutions in Structural Health Monitoring Systems

The chapter describes the application of prognostic techniques to the domain of structural health and demonstrates the efficacy of the methods using fatigue data from a graphite-epoxy composite coupon. Prognostics denotes the in-situ assessment of the health of a component and the repeated estimation of remaining life, conditional on anticipated future usage. The methods shown here use a physics-based modeling approach whereby the behavior of the damaged components is encapsulated via mathematical equations that describe the characteristics of the components as it experiences increasing degrees of degradation. Mathematical rigorous techniques are used to extrapolate the remaining life to a failure threshold. Additionally, mathematical tools are used to calculate the uncertainty associated with making predictions. The information stemming from the predictions can be used in an operational context for go/no go decisions, quantify risk of ability to complete a (set of) mission or operation, and when to schedule maintenance.