Evaluating performance of a fuel nozzle test stand under varying configurations using Taguchi parameter design - An industrial application

Taguchi parameter design is an efficient and effective method for evaluating and optimizing parameters for a given process. This article describes a study involving the use of Taguchi parameter design for the evaluation of pressure measurement devices used on fuel nozzle test stands. This study examines and compares the performance of a digital display pressure transducer device and a mechanical analog pressure gage, under various parameter levels and configurations. Both an inner and outer orthogonal array are used to quantify control factor variability within the pressure gage calibration and measurement process, given two noise factors. Control factors include two types of dead weight testers, two types of pressure measurement devices, and three set pressures. Two noise factors utilized here were two different operators and the change in direction of the pressure before measurement (upward or downward). Collected data are used to determine the optimal levels of three quality characteristics: pressure difference, settling time, and hysteresis. Taguchi parameter design analysis of signal-to-noise ratio (S/N ratio) found an optimal test stand configuration included a pressure transducer with digital display with any combination of the other control factors, although with some sacrifice of response time. Verification of this selected configuration was conducted through linearity studies.