Pipeline Leak Detection Device Matthew Johnston Brett Griffin

Motivation Relevant and realistic problem for industry in Alberta Always in need of low-cost, innovative solutions Traditional flow measurement systems are expensive, bulky, intrusive to the pipeline

Background Unintentional changes in flow rate can be attributed to leaks in pipeline Speed of sound with flow differs than speed of sound against flow Differences in times of signal transmission is proportional to velocity of gas Velocity of gas is proportional to flow rate

Functionality Accurately measure fluctuations in flow rate Mounted externally to the pipe with no modifications made to pipe Energy efficient Low-cost Traditional flow rate meter

Hardware Design Off-board circuitry as transducer to DE 2 board interface Interface requires Op. Amp, ADC Signal filtering done on-board DE 2 FPGA All user input via DE 2 board; no extra input devices necessary Off-board Components: On-board Components: Transducers Nios. II/e Processor Op. Amp FPGA implementation of finite impulse response filter (FIR) ADC Transducer housing/mounting hardware User input (buttons, switches) LCD screen LEDs RAM/ROM

Software Design User Interface Data Processing Mode Select (Setup, Default) Signal validation User enters system data and time and pipe attributes. Average ‘Speed of Sound’ compared against threshold value. User prompted to set threshold value based on alarm trigger. (i. e. . 0 - 100)

Challenges ADC operation, functionality and accuracy Filtering of the digital signal Finding ideal transducers for leak detection (low-cost + high frequency) Successfully recognizing valid signals (ie. Pipe signal vs. Flow signal) Accomplishments Transducer-to-transducer communication Transducer interfacing hardware design ( Tri-state buffers, Op-Amp, ADC) Op-Amp circuit prototype

Test Plan HARDWARE Output signal driver Transducer communication Op. Amp Verification ADC Functionality FIR Filter Functionality SOFTWARE User interaction software flow verification Time stamp driver (on board HAL) Signal verification

Optional Feature: Wireless data transmission capabilities to off-site computer Final Version Contingency: Transducer-to-pipe coupling issues may require holes drilled into pipe for testing.