US Patent 8725456 Decomposition technique for remaining useful life prediction

The prognostic tool disclosed here decomposes the problem of estimating the remaining useful life (RUL) of a component or sub-system into two separate regression problems: the feature-to-damage mapping and the operational conditions-to-damage-rate mapping. These maps are initially generated in off-line mode. One or more regression algorithms are used to generate each of these maps from measurements (and features derived from these), operational conditions, and ground truth information. This decomposition technique allows for the explicit quantification and management of different sources of uncertainty present in the process. Next, the maps are used in an on-line mode where run-time data (sensor measurements and operational conditions) are used in conjunction with the maps generated in off-line mode to estimate both current damage state as well as future damage accumulation. Remaining life is computed by subtracting the instance when the extrapolated damage reaches the failure threshold from the instance when the prediction is made.