Modulating fuel for a turbine engine
AssigneeGeneral Electric Company
InventorDavid Justin Brady
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A fuel supply system for a turbine engine that provides a modulated thrust control malfunction accommodation (TCMA). The fuel supply system can include a fuel line that fluidly connects a fuel tank and the turbine engine. A fuel pump and a fuel metering valve can be fluidly connected to the fuel line. A bypass line can fluidly connect to the fuel line. Flow through the bypass line can be controlled using a bypass valve and a balancing pressure valve. The TCMA can then modulate the fuel flow using the valves.
Claims20
A fuel supply system for a turbine engine comprising a rotor, the fuel supply system comprising:
- a fuel tank;
- a fuel line fluidly coupling the fuel tank to the turbine engine;
- a fuel pump fluidly coupled to the fuel line and driven by the rotor to pump fuel through the fuel line from the fuel tank to the turbine engine;
- a bypass line fluidly coupling the fuel line, downstream of the fuel pump, to at least one of the fuel pump, the fuel tank, or the fuel line, upstream of the fuel pump;
- a fuel metering valve fluidly coupled to the fuel line downstream of the fuel pump;
- a bypass valve fluidly coupling the fuel line to the bypass line upstream of the fuel metering valve;
- and
- a balancing pressure valve fluidly coupling the bypass line downstream of the bypass valve to at least one of the fuel pump, the fuel tank, the fuel line upstream of the fuel pump, or the bypass line upstream of the bypass valve, and maintains the pressure differential across the bypass valve at a predetermined bypass pressure differential.
A fuel supply system for supplying fuel from a fuel tank to a combustion engine with a rotor, the fuel supply system comprising:
- a fuel supply line supplying fuel from the fuel tank to the combustion engine;
- a fuel pump pumping fuel through the fuel supply line;
- a fuel metering valve controlling the flow of fuel through the fuel supply line to the combustion engine;
- a bleed valve assembly bleeding off fuel supplied to the engine based on the pressure difference across the fuel metering valve.
A method for controlling the supply of fuel from a fuel tank to a turbine engine having a rotor, the method comprising:
- pumping fuel from the fuel tank to the turbine engine at a first rate that is a function of a rotational speed of the rotor;
- metering the pumped fuel being supplied to the engine at a second rate that is a function of a throttle setting of the turbine engine;
- after the metering, redirecting unused pumped fuel;
- and
- controlling the amount of redirected unused fuel based on predetermined pressure differential between the pumped fuel and the metered fuel.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.