https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/65863 2026-04-26T14:07:03Z 2026-04-26T14:07:03Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/98692 2022-07-04T06:15:40Z 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: CFD modelling of offshore floating wind turbine rotors Abstract: Significant research in the field of Offshore Floating Wind Turbine (OFWT) rotor aerodynamics has been documented in literature, including validated aerodynamic models based on Blade Element Momentum (BEM) and vortex methods, amongst others. However, the effects of platform induced motion on the rotor performance or any research related to such areas is rather limited. The project’s approach is based on an actuator disc (AD) technique implemented in a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) solver. The AD approach couples the Blade Element Theory (BET) for estimating rotating blade loads with a Navier Stokes (NS) solver to simulate the wake created by the turbine. Initially, results from a CFD-based AD numerical model for a fixed (non-surging) rotor are compared with those obtained from a BEM theory, existing experimental work and some computational methods. Furthermore, the project also focuses on the effect of tip speed ratio (TSR) on the rotor thrust and power coefficients. This is followed by the analysis of floating wind turbines specifically in relation to surge motion, through an AD technique implemented in CFD software, ANSYS Fluent®. The approach was slightly altered such that the BET-CFD coupling was implemented in a transient manner i.e. following the sinusoidal variation of the rotor surge position with time to account for the influence of regular waves on OFWT motion. The floating platform data extracted from the AD approach was compared to the non-surging turbine data obtained, to display platform motion effects clearly. An important step in the presented work is the adaptation of the AD model to model a full-scale offshore wind turbine. Floating (surging) analysis then followed with discussion of similarities and differences between data of both CFD models. Lastly, educated conclusions are presented from the observations of computed data, including wave motion effects on performance and therefore design challenges. The project explored the dependency of the rotor performance on the surge frequency and amplitude. It is observed that larger values resulted in larger cyclic loads on the rotor. Similarly, the effects of the sinusoidal surge motion on rotor aerodynamics was clearly captured by the CFD-based AD approach. Lastly, it is found that under specific surge conditions, the efficiency of a surging rotor may exceed that of a fixed rotor. This phenomenon has been observed in both rotors investigated in this study. Description: M.SC.ENG.

2020-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/66879 2021-01-08T15:02:24Z 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Design of a processor for embedded image processing applications Abstract: The aim of this project is to design a microprocessor, or more generically, a processing element or system-on-chip that is optimised for real-time image processing tasks. This was primarily achieved through the design on an FPGA of various image-processing accelerating peripherals, each controlled by a softcore microcontroller. Thorough analysis of available literature including an extensive technical review resulted in the design to include hardware accelerators for morphology, convolution and RGB to HSV conversion. These peripherals were chosen due to their utility in image processing applications such as object recognition. A VGA peripheral was also designed so that the processor can display images. Processing for the morphology, convolution and VGA peripherals takes place independently of the processor’s routine since data is offloaded to the peripheral and the processor can then access the result when operation is complete. The design includes custom hardware, software together with available IPs by Xilinx Inc. The processor was also designed to be able to communicate with a PC interface that was designed in JAVA. This allows the user to transmit an image via ethernet and this is eventually stored in DDR4 memory accompanying the processor. Testing proved the capability of the system to successfully retrieve transmitted images. Processor was benchmarked with a modern Intel Core i7 CPU and whilst there are noticeable performance differences, the designed system’s power consumption is significantly lower by an order of magnitude of more than 10. Overall, the main aims of this project were achieved with a series of peripherals designed that can be integrated with a Xilinx Microblaze softcore processor in an FPGA. This resulted in an embedded processor that can execute the accelerated operations deterministically and in real-time. As can be seen in the results section all peripherals function as expected. Following testing, some limitations were identified particularly in the FPGA’s BRAM resources and in turn mitigation strategies such as the inclusion of a Direct Memory Access (DMA) module were suggested. Description: B.ENG.ELECTRICAL&ELECTRONIC

2020-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/66878 2021-01-08T14:46:16Z 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: An airborne collision detection and alerting system for general aviation Abstract: Aviation has been a growing industry due to being a key contribution in providing a rapid worldwide transportation network. In view of this, more people are aspiring to become airline pilots in response to such demand. This leads to an increase in training flights by virtue of the training required. With the already busy airspace and the increasing training flights, more mid-air collisions are prone to happen. Airborne Collision Avoidance Systems (ACAS) already exist and proven to be successful in hindering a mid-air collision from happening. Regrettably, ACAS systems are primarily designed to operate on large commercial aircraft with no intent to be installed on light training aircraft. This raises the need of having an ACAS system equally available to light aircraft. To achieve this, the proposed system will operate using the already available technology that of Automatic Dependent Surveillance – Broadcast (ADS-B) in conjunction with a number of algorithm programs. These algorithms will deduce if any surrounding traffic are a potential threat. This dissertation discusses some research into radar technology and its mode of operation, the extraction and decoding of ADS-B data from Mode-S extended squitters, hardware and software selection as well as designing algorithms for evaluating the decoded ADS-B data. The software was improved over multiple consecutive tests to improve the software’s capability. For the purpose of practicing situational awareness as well as being able to advise of any potential conflict, two algorithms were designed to operate in parallel. These will evaluate traffic based on the time to closest approach (CPA) or lateral distance between both aircraft independently. A number of scenarios were tested in examining different portions of the algorithm. All results were tabulated and details about the occurrences are put forward. Real-life testing was conducting on actual aircraft, testing the operation of the whole system from capturing Mode-S extended squitters to advising the user with any alerts. Tests conducted both in a simulation environment and using real-life ADS-B data were successful. This provides confidence in the correct operation of the algorithms and indicates that the system has the potential to assist general aviation pilots in identifying traffic threats. Description: B.ENG.ELECTRICAL&ELECTRONIC

2020-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/66877 2021-01-08T14:42:10Z 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z

Title: Development of a data acquisition system for the UoMR team Abstract: In the past couple of years, the University of Malta Racing (UOMR) team have been attempting to design and develop an on-board data acquisition (DAQ) system to acquire and log data from several systems on-board the race car. To date some progress has been made but a complete working system is still not available. This project aims to develop an operational data bus capable of handling all the required transfer of data, together with a standalone DAQ system to capture real-time information in a real-time efficient manner. The on-board data bus needs to be robust and flexible such that it ensures a good performance in terms of noise immunity and should allow for easy reconfiguration by fellow team members. This would warrant future use and scalability. Throughout this project the DAQ system was developed and a controller area network (CAN) was set up to connect all boards of the DAQ system and all boards on-board the formula style racing car. The components of the DAQ system were all tested, and the correct functionality of the CAN network was verified. Detailed documentation about the implementation of the complete DAQ system, its CAN setup and its CAN data configurations are provided as a user handbook to encourage future UOMR team members to further develop this DAQ system by, incorporating any additional sensors, nodes and to modify the performance of the controller area network. Description: B.ENG.ELECTRICAL&ELECTRONIC

2020-01-01T00:00:00Z