Interview

Gary J. Patterson
Staff Combustion Engineer
GM Powertrain-Racing, Wixom, MI, USA

1. For which application do you use AVL combustion measurement equipment?

We purchased several IndiSET 641's for combustion testing, to supercede our legacy combustion analysis systems for high performance engine development. At high engine speeds the IndiSET's Real Time Processor power and fast data transfer bandwidth allow accelerated testing with less wear and tear on our engines.

2. What are the benefits for you in the daily use?

In addition to the excellent integration with PUMA, which allows traditional combustion metrics to be streamed at 20Hz, the system has exceeded our expectations with its Torsional Vibration Analysis capability, and excellent custom calculation (CalcGraf) and data presentation capabilities (CONCERTO). The extended memory option (256mB/C1 card) allows tremendous flexibility in logging raw data for extended duration to capture spurious combustion events in great detail.

3. The transition to a new combustion analysis system requires also some changes at your staff. How difficult was this phase?

AVL Graz (Josef Moik and his team) has been exceptional in adapting the IndiCom software capability of the system to meet our specific requirements. The hardware speed and flexibility is first class, and is a great foundation for building advanced combustion capability. The software GUI is well designed and easy to learn, and building custom calcluations is a snap. AVLNA is providing a full time indicating engineer for us, and he has been excellent; the performance of the 641 coupled with this indicating engineers advanced software knowledge has been able to improve our already effective combustion measurement capability.

Your questions, comments, wishes?