Distributed Wireless Antenna Sensors for Boiler Condition Monitoring
- Univ. of Texas, Arlington, TX (United States)
- Univ. of California, San Diego, CA (United States)
Monitoring the operational conditions of coal-fired boilers is an important task that could bring tremendous benefits, including in-situ process control, real-time health assessment of structural components, improved heat transfer efficiency, reduced downtime, etc. Moreover, in-situ distributed sensing of the boiler conditions would provide large scale in-situ measurement data that will help us gain fundamental understandings of the combustion and heat transfer processes as well as enable the developments of new simulation tools, which could eventually lead to better design and more efficient operation of the boilers. The objectives of this research were to (a) develop wireless passive antenna sensors without electronics; (b) demonstrate multi-modality sensing using a signal antenna sensor; and (c) fabricate the antenna sensor from high-temperature materials. In this project, we have demonstrated that an antenna sensor or sensor array without any electronics can be wirelessly interrogated from a distance. In addition, a low-cost compact wireless sensor interrogator was developed for dynamic interrogation of the passive antenna sensor. We validated that a dual-frequency antenna sensor is capable of simultaneous strain and temperature measurements or temperature and ash accumulation measurements; all parameters are relevant to boiler condition monitoring. By measuring the temperature and ash accumulation height simultaneously, the dielectric constant of the ash as well as its temperature dependency can also be characterized. This capability could lead to potential applications of the antenna sensor for combustion process monitoring based on the ash composition. We also investigated different techniques of fabricating the antenna sensor using high-temperature materials such as alumina substrate and platinum paste and characterized the thermal response of the antenna sensor. A linear relationship between the antenna resonant frequency and the temperature change was validated.
- Research Organization:
- Univ. of Texas, Arlington, TX (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE
- DOE Contract Number:
- FE0023118
- OSTI ID:
- 1503678
- Report Number(s):
- DOE-UTA-0023118-1
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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