Patent ID: 9280620
Filing Date: 2016-03-08
CPC Classification: G01B,G06F,H01L

Claim Text:
1. A method for operating a gas turbine component under cyclic stress, the method comprising: operating a system for probabilistic fatigue crack life estimation, said system comprising a processor and an output device, the system being operated for: defining a plurality of representations of the component from material property scatter data and flaw-size scatter data of the component, wherein each representation is defined by one possible material condition and flaw-size condition associated with the component, for each individual representation, selecting a component location and determining whether said individual representation fails after a given number of cycles N, based on determination of a crack growth in the selected location, the crack growth being determined on the basis of the material condition and the flaw-size condition in the selected location, wherein failure of the individual representation is determined if the crack growth is determined to be unstable, determining a sum total of the number of the representations that failed after N cycles, and determining and outputting a probability of failure of the component after N cycles, as PoF(N)=Nf/S, wherein: PoF(N) is the probability of failure of the component after N cycles, Nf is the sum total of the number of representations that are determined to have failed after N cycles, and S is the total number of representations, and controlling a downtime of the component based on an output generated by said system.