To calculate a probability of an optical sensor's irregular discharge, a light detection system includes an optical sensor, an application voltage generating circuit that applies a drive pulse voltage to the optical sensor, a discharge determining portion that detects the optical sensor's discharge, a discharge probability calculating portion that calculates a discharge probability in a first state in which light from an additional light source having a known light quantity is incident on the optical sensor or the additional light source is turned off, and in a second state in which the additional light source's turning-on/turning-off state is different from the first state and the drive pulse voltage's pulse width is the same as the first state, a sensitivity parameter storing portion that stores the optical sensor's sensitivity parameters, and another discharge probability calculating portion that calculates a discharge probability of the optical sensor's irregular discharge.

Embodiments disclosed herein are directed to devices and methods for improving operation of a combustion system. According to various embodiments disclosed herein, a prefabricated integrated combustion assembly is disclosed that may be installed into a combustion chamber of a combustion system. The combustion system may be a new combustion system that is being manufactured or a conventional combustion system that is being retrofitted.

The present disclosure relates to a burner control system, comprising a controller, a burner connectable to a combustible gas supply and comprising a controllable valve coupled to the controller, an optical sensor arranged at the burner and coupled to the controller, wherein the controller is configured to determine a use state of the burner, from a group of use states comprising at least an ignition state, based on a measurement signal of the optical sensor that is indicative for a light level corresponding to said use state, and to selectively control the controllable valve in dependency of said use state of the burner.

A combustion assembly for a gas turbine engine includes a combustor, a monochromator, and a photodetector assembly. The combustor forms a combustion chamber. The monochromator is disposed outside the combustion chamber. The monochromator is configured to receive an optical input from the combustion chamber and direct an optical output. The optical input has a range of light wavelengths. The optical output has a subset of the range of light wavelengths. The photodetector assembly is disposed outside the combustion chamber. The photodetector assembly is configured to receive the optical output from the monochromator and generate an output signal representative of one or more optical characteristics of the optical output.

A burner control system for controlling the operation of a fuel burner arranged to burn a combination of a supply of fuel and a supply of air is provided. The burner control system is arranged to receive from an exhaust gas analyzer one or more signals, each signal being indicative of the level of an exhaust gas emitted by the fuel burner; receive from a photodetector a signal indicative of a level of electromagnetic radiation output by the flame of the fuel burner; and control at least one of the supply of fuel and the supply of air to the burner based on the one or more signals received from the exhaust gas analyzer and the signal received from the photodetector.

To grasp a state of a combustion apparatus based on a flame state of a burner, a discharge number measurement unit measures the number of discharges of a flame sensor per unit time. A light emission information generation unit generates, as light emission information, information obtained based on a value obtained by dividing a total (accumulation) of the number of discharges per unit time measured by the discharge number measurement unit by a total measurement time. A determination unit determines the state of the combustion apparatus to be inspected based on the light emission information generated by the light emission information generation unit as described above.