Real-Time Prognostics of Engineered Systems under Time Varying External Conditions Based on the COX PHM and VARX Hybrid Approach

In spite of the development of the Prognostics and Health Management (PHM) during past decades, the reliability prognostics of engineered systems under time-varying external conditions still remains a challenge in such a field. When considering the challenge mentioned above, a hybrid method for predicting the reliability index and the Remaining Useful Life (RUL) of engineered systems under time-varying external conditions is proposed in this paper. The proposed method is competent in reflecting the influence of time-varying external conditions on the degradation behaviour of engineered systems. Based on a subset of the Commercial Modular Aero-Propulsion System Simulation (C-MAPSS) dataset as case studies, the Cox Proportional Hazards Model (Cox PHM) with time-varying covariates is utilised to generate the reliability indices of individual turbofan units. Afterwards, a Vector Autoregressive model with Exogenous variables (VARX) combined with pairwise Conditional Granger Causality (CGC) tests for sensor selections is defined to model the time-varying influence of sensor signals on the reliability indices of different units that have been previously generated by the Cox PHM with time-varying covariates. During the reliability prediction, the Fourier Grey Model (FGM) is employed with the time series models for long-term forecasting of the external conditions. The results show that the method that is proposed in this paper is competent for the RUL prediction as compared with baseline approaches.