On-Shaft Vibration Measurement Using a MEMS Accelerometer for Faults Diagnosis in Rotating Machines

Abstract

The healthy condition of a rotating machine leads to safe and cheap operation of almost all industrial facilities and mechanical systems. To achieve such a goal, vibration-based condition monitoring has proved to be a well-accepted technique that detects incipient fault symptoms. The conventional way of On-Bearing Vibration Measurement (OBVM) captures symptoms of different faults, however, it requires a relatively expensive setup, an additional space for the auxiliary devices and cabling in addition to an experienced analyst.On-Shaft Vibration Measurement (OSVM) is an emerging method proposed to offer more reliable Faults Diagnosis (FD) tools with less number of sensors, minimal processing time and lower system and maintenance costs. The advancement in sensor and wireless communications technologies enables attaching a MEMS accelerometer with a miniaturised wireless data acquisition unit directly to the rotor without altering the machine dynamics.In this study, OSVM is analysed during constant speed and run-up operations of a test rig. The observations showed response modulation, hence, a Finite Element (FE) analysis has been carried out to help interpret the experimental observations. The FE analysis confirmed that the modulation is due to the rotary motion of the on-shaft sensor. A demodulation method has been developed to solve this problem.The FD capability of OSVM has been compared to that of OBVM using conventional analysis where the former provided more efficient diagnosis with less number of sensors. To incorporate more features, a method has been developed to diagnose faults based on Principal Component Analysis and Nearest Neighbour classifier. Furthermore, the method is enhanced using Linear Discriminant Analysis to do the diagnosis without the need for a classifier. Another faults diagnosis method has been developed that ensures the generalisation of extracted faults features from OSVM data of a specific machine to similar machines mounted on different foundations.

Date of Award	1 Aug 2013
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	The University of Manchester
Supervisor	Jyoti Sinha (Supervisor) & Sunday Oyadiji (Supervisor)