|
The comfort and safety of the cabin environment is critical for both passengers and crew. Leveraging the experience gained in developing wireless sensor technologies for industrial applications, TDG has turned its focus to sensor applications on the aircraft. The first application born of this effort is a monitoring system designed to provide the operator with a comprehensive profile of the cabin environment during any given flight. Low cost, low-power temperature, pressure, humidity and oxygen level sensors record the primary comfort metrics throughout the cabin. At the same time, volatile organic compound (VOC) sensors detect irritants or other, potentially harmful, compounds that otherwise should not be present in the cabin atmosphere. On-sensor data storage allows engineering and maintenance technicians to review cabin environmental data post-flight.
Contact us to discuss cabin monitoring technologies or to test our battery-powered, handheld air quality data logger. |
An important consideration of the aircraft cabin environment is the potential for introduction of contaminants in to the cabin air supply. These contaminants can be external, such as exhaust from ground equipment while at the gate, fluid leaks near APU inlets or other aircraft exhaust during taxi and ground operations.
Contaminants can also be introduced by the aircraft bleed air source directly. A topic of much discussion and study is the potential for oil leaks in to the bleed air supply. The high temperatures associated with the bleed air can pyrolize the turbine oils and introduce harmful chemicals in to the cabin air supply. The VOC sensors in our cabin air monitoring system are highly sensitive to the volatile compounds released by heated turbine oils, and TDG is studying the effectiveness of VOC sensors in the cabin to document bleed air contamination events. |