Information model for combustion engines

Abstract

The pace of production is accelerating in maritime industry. At the same time the size of ships is getting bigger and on-board systems are getting more complex. These things present challenges during commissioning as all systems must be tested and they must work as a whole. From the automation systems’ point of view there are no commonly used standardized ways for different systems to exchange data between each other. OPC UA is widely seen as a promising solution for the communication between different systems and devices. It is a platform independent interoperability standard for secure and reliable data exchange. The lack of standardized communication methods applies to the whole maritime industry but in the thesis focus was on the communication between a reciprocating combustion engine and external systems. More specifically, the goal of the thesis was to create an OPC UA information model for Wärtsilä combustion engines. Design science was used as the research paradigm for the thesis since it is suitable for the development of a concrete solution. The basic theories and principles behind OPC UA were reviewed in the beginning of the thesis project. In addition to the OPC UA, ISO 19848 standard for on-board data exchange was researched. As the result of the thesis there was the first version of the information model for reciprocating internal combustion engines. ISO 19848 related information was added to the model to enable the universal identification of engine signals without any manufacturer specific knowledge. The results stated that the solution had several advantages compared to the current solution.