Advanced Durability Systems for Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Propulsion

Group 2-3 UAS engines have low mean time between overhauls (MTBOs), often with as little as 200-400 hours before maintenance must be conducted.This leads to significant maintenance cost and logistics tail for deployed operations.Two-stroke piston and rotary engines for Group 2-3 platforms have common maintenance drivers such as carbon fouling, and wear of cylinders, housings and bearings.Phase I research demonstrated that oil in the fuel contributes heavily to carbon fouling.A solution is needed to significantly reduce friction and wear without the need for oil lubrication.In the Phase II program IBC Materials and Technologies, in partnership with Northwest UAV Propulsion Systems (NWUAV), will apply its Plasma Electrolytic Oxidation (PEO) and Diamond-Like Carbon (DLC) coatings to provide an ultra-low friction and wear system that can operate under significantly reduced oil mixture ratios.In addition, IBC will optimize its PEO coatings to provide a fouling resistant, thermal barrier coating (TBC) for piston surfaces.This combined coating system will provide a significant reduction in carbon fouling, cylinder and bearing wear, and other key failure mechanisms to deliver a 2-4X MTBO improvement for UAV engines, resulting in a ~60% decrease in operational cost per flight hour.