Hector S. Bourgeois, President

Mr. Bourgeois serves as Fern's president. In addition to his administrative duties, he leads all of Fern's gas turbine hardware development projects. These projects have included the Schelde Heron H-1 gas turbine design, an upgrade of the Curtiss-Wright MOD-POD gas turbine casing, and an improved design of the Rolls-Royce Avon transition piece. Before joining Fern in the early 1980s, he worked for GE, Pratt & Whitney, and Rocketdyne. While at Rocketdyne, he was responsible for the design of high-speed turbo-pumps used in the engine for the space shuttle. He has a BS in Mechanical Engineering, and, in total, he has over 35 years of turbomachinery hardware design experience.

Steven N. Donaldson, Project Manager

Mr. Donaldson is a project manager responsible for feasibility studies, failure analysis and customer training. He also provides technical leadership for Fern's design group. He has been involved in gas turbine research, design and development since 1983. His Masters thesis, which was funded by NASA, studies the effects of unsteady flow resulting from vane-blade wake interaction on turbine performance. Before joining Fern he spent 17 years working as a design engineer for Pratt & Whitney Aircraft where his duties included aerodynamic performance analysis and testing of turbine airfoil designs in cascades, rigs and engines, the design and development of turbine vanes, blades and blade outer air seals for commercial aircraft engines and the development of repairs for customer-owned turbine and compressor hardware. He has a BS and MS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Connecticut where he also worked as a graduate teaching assistant.

Paul Simas, Senior Designer

Mr. Simas is a senior mechanical designer and has worked for Fern since 1981. He is responsible for managing Fern's fuel nozzle refurbishment and flow testing service and leads the inspection and diagnosis of fuel nozzle problems. In addition to those duties, he is a member of Fern's design team and is an expert user of the AutoCAD™ and ANSYS™ software packages. He participated in the redesign of the fuel nozzles for a Ruston Typhoon gas turbine that operated on landfill gas. He has also been involved in the design of a new 1.4 MW reheat gas turbine for a European manufacturer.

Donald Degan, Designer

Mr. Degan is a mechanical designer with over twenty years of experience in the production of layout and final manufacturing drawings for all parts of gas turbine power plants including nozzles, casings, inlet and exhaust ducts, acoustical enclosures, and overall equipment layouts. Prior to joining Fern he was a survey party chief and draftsman working under subcontract to the Massachusetts Division of Highways. He also worked as a senior designer on civil engineering projects for the Massachusetts Dept. of Public Works, Waterways Division.

Philip Levine, Aero & Thermal Consultant

Mr. Levine provides aerodynamics and thermal system analysis for Fern. He has been the lead investigator of Fern's EPRI-sponsored gas turbine power augmentation program that is now entering its twelfth year and has recently written an EPRI performance and maintenance guide for operators of gas turbine axial compressors (EPRI TR-111038). Earlier, Mr. Levine pioneered the use of personal computers for monitoring the thermodynamic performance of gas turbines in real-time. He wrote the original version of Efficiency-Map, which is widely used in the electric power industry for on-line monitoring, and has led the development of Fern's PEGASYS™ software, which is used to monitor gas turbines in industrial and power generation applications. Mr. Levine has previously worked for NASA, USAF AERL, and Avco Systems. He has a BS and MS in Mechanical Engineering and is a registered Professional Engineer.

Bill Farrell, Design Engineering Consultant

Mr. Farrell has over 40 years of engineering experience in turbomachinery, high-speed rotating machinery, and power generation equipment. Most of this experience has been in the design and development of new gas turbines. Before retiring from full-time employment in 1995, he worked for both GE and Fern. At GE he was the lead mechanical engineer on the development of the state-of-the-art LM6000 aero-derivative gas turbine and received a US patent for the LM6000 design. Earlier, he developed the technique for fully designing an air-cooled turbine blade for large industrial gas turbines and he invented the long-shank bucket and cover plate design that was used in all of GE's two-shaft gas turbines. At Fern, he led the mechanical design of the TF-10 gas turbine. He currently works as a consultant to Fern on an as-needed basis.

Bill Glater, Consulting Metallurgist

Mr. Glater has over 25 years of experience in the areas of materials and process engineering. Included in this experience are five years as the principal materials and process engineer at Pratt & Whitney's Turbo-Power and Marine division supporting the design of aero-derivative gas turbines used for generation of industrial power and marine propulsion. Mr. Glater has a BS in Metallurgical Engineering from the Colorado School of Mines and an MS in Management from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He is a registered engineer in both Connecticut and Massachusetts. He currently works as a consultant to Fern on an as-needed basis.

Dick Schiefer, Combustion Consultant

Mr. Schiefer has over 40 years of combustion engineering and design experience, principally with GE where he worked at various positions including manager of combustion system development. In addition to serving as Fern's combustion specialist, he continues to work as a consultant for GE on an as-needed basis.

Dwight DeNise, Field Engineering Consultant

Mr. DeNise specializes in gas turbine commissioning, start-up, and training and has extensive international experience. He has participated in the start-up of GE Frame 3s, 5s, and 9s, and Ruston TB4000s. He has written training and maintenance manuals for Pratt & Whitney jet engines, Curtiss-Wright MOD PODs, and Dresser-Rand DJ-270G and DR-61G power turbines. Qatar, India, Nigeria, and Panama are among the locations he where he has worked. He has a BSME from the University of Washington and an MBA from the University of Connecticut. He currently works as a consultant to Fern on an as-needed basis.

Harley Plante, Technical Field Support

Mr. Plante provides field service support and on-site installation supervision for Fern's MOD POD power turbine hardware upgrade kits. This includes power turbine assembly, check-out and start up of Rolls-Royce Olympus gas generators and Curtiss-Wright power turbines. Previously, he was the manager of service and a field engineer for Curtiss-Wright. He currently works as a consultant to Fern on an as-needed basis.