Diesel Burner Controller

The Need for Custom Design

For many years Babington Technology had used an off-the-shelf controller for its Airtronic diesel burner. The US military was using it extensively as part of their field feeding systems, but it had several weaknesses that were creating support headaches for Babington. RMB was brought in to explore the possibility of developing a custom control for the Airtronic burner. The challenge was to make the design backward compatible while adding new features for protection and diagnosis of the overall system.

Simulated, Tested, and Approved

The first step was to build a true-to-life simulation of the new proposed control. This included a fully working user interface that simulated behavior in the presence of under/over voltage line conditions, non-sinusoidal power, and ignition/fuel faults. The simulation demonstrated the controller’s look and function, thus cutting down enormously on the iterations typically required by such a project.

Upon approval of the simulated behavior, we designed the housing, a custom LCD, two printed circuit boards, and a substantial amount of complex firmware. After successful testing of the prototypes, we helped select a contract manufacturer and supervised the transfer of the design for production.

Better Products Mean Bigger Profits

Today Babington finally has a control that matches the sophistication of its Airtronic burner. The control’s new capabilities are opening up new markets for Babington, while its support issues are fading away as the UBIAC is deployed across its existing customer base.