Application of condition monitoring

Condition monitoring can be used to glean information on the state of rotating/moving parts through measurement of vibrations at machines/drives/gears and subsequent analysis with suitable mathematical tools (e.g. TwinCAT library, FFT, custom user programs).

The existing vibration is recorded continuously or at longer, regular time intervals and finally compared with a setpoint value/initial value (Fig. Sample of ball bearing damage and subsequent analysis).
In this way any damage can be detected at an early stage. Instead of changing components preventively on a regular basis or waiting for sudden damage and subsequent expensive downtime and possible consequential damage, repairs and downtimes become plannable. Needless failures, consequential damage or prematurely and costly replacement of intact parts can be avoided.

In the example above the so-called envelope enables analysis of shock pulses resulting from unevenness in the roller bearing. The defective element can be identified based on the periodicity (envelope spectrum).