This presentation was made at NAFEMS Americas 2018 Seminar, "Aerospace Simulation Engineering - Navigating the Digital Thread".

Aerospace manufacturers and suppliers are facing an increasingly challenging and competitive marketplace as their products are becoming more complex via tighter integration of systems and cyber-physical environments. That being said, there are rising interests to incorporate Digital Threads as communication frameworks for sharing product lifecycle information seamlessly and Digital Twin methodologies for assessing virtually the expected and future operational physics-based capabilities of a product throughout its lifecycle. Utilizing these techniques in conjunction with the latest engineering simulation tools effectively, accurately and efficiently to meet business goals has never been more critical, as aerospace engineering continues to move into a highly-advanced technological space.

ABSTRACT

GE is developing a framework to drive the Digital Thread upstream into engineering design. This framework is being developed for all GE Businesses, including GE Aviation (jet and turboprop engines), GE Power (power generation gas turbines), GE Renewables (wind and hydro turbines), and others. Here, the Digital Thread connects the multi-disciplinary engineering part/component/product design process, manufacturing & supply chain, testing, and field service. This fully connected Digital Thread allows for changes and modifications to the part or product, throughout the product lifecycle, to be quickly and fully evaluated and assessed by the engineering, manufacturing, supply chain, and services teams. Technologies included in DT4D include 1) Design Space Mapping, Design System Integration & High Performance Computing; 2) Analytical and Field Big Data Management; and 3) Machine Learning / Scalable Analytics to correlate and understand trade-offs between design, manufacturing and field parameters and product life, performance, reliability, and other metrics.