Engineering Seminar (17 Dec): Wireless Sensor Node Development and Deployment on Wind Turbines and Telescopes

Engineering Institute Lecture Series
Sponsored by the Engineering Institute, American Society of Mechanical Engineers, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, and The American Nuclear Society

UNCLASSIFIED – OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

Title: Wireless Sensor Node Development and Deployment on Wind Turbines and Telescopes
Presented by: Stuart G. Taylor, Los Alamos National Laboratory

Date: Tuesday, December 17, 2013
Time: 3:30 – 5:00 PM
Location: Los Alamos Research Park, 2nd Floor, Conference Room 203A

Abstract: This talk will cover the development of wireless sensor nodes in the Engineering Institute at LANL, including the Wireless Impedance Device (WID) and the Wireless Active Sensing Platform (WASP). These sensing platforms were specifically designed for Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) applications. Two sensor node deployment examples will also be discussed. In the first example, passive acceleration measurements are used to provide an indication of drive system failure in a high-performance robotic telescope. In the second example, active sensing measurement techniques are used to identify incipient fatigue crack damage in a composite wind turbine rotor blade.

Biography: Stuart G. Taylor received the B.S. and M.S. degrees in mechanical engineering from the University of Houston in 2005 and 2007, respectively. He received the Ph.D. degree in structural engineering from the University of California, San Diego, in 2013. From 2007 to 2013, he was a graduate research assistant at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), during which time he designed and field-tested sensor nodes for structural health monitoring (SHM) and conducted research focusing on wind turbine rotor blade SHM as part of the Intelligent Wind Turbine (IWT) Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) project at LANL. Dr. Taylor is currently a research and development engineer in the Applied Engineering and Technology division at LANL.

For more information contact the institutional host Chuck Farrar, farrar@lanl.gov, 663-5330.