Intelligent, online monitoring system provides early warnings of damage to critical rotating plant and machinery

Developed to help companies monitor vibration levels on critical rotating plant or machinery, including electric motors, drives, bearing arrangements, gearboxes, pumps, generators, ventilators, fans and excavators, Schaeffler UK launched its new ‘FAG ProCheck’ online monitoring system for the first time to UK customers at the MAINTEC 2007 exhibition (20-22 March at the NEC).

FAG ProCheck enables maintenance teams to monitor vibration levels and diagnose faults on critical rotating plant and machinery, therefore preventing costly machine breakdowns and eliminating problems before they occur that interrupt production. Almost any industry sector can benefit from using FAG ProCheck, including steel and aluminium processing; paper mills; raw material excavation and mineral processing; mining and quarrying; food and beverage; oil and gas; and energy production (including wind, water and nuclear).

Ian Pledger, Field Service Engineer at FAG Industrial Services (FIS), the asset management and condition monitoring division of the Schaeffler Group, comments: “What really differentiates ProCheck from other products is its inherent flexibility due to its modular design. This means the system can be easily integrated into a customer’s existing control and automation environment.”

FAG ProCheck is intelligent, easy to set up and is both robust and reliable. In addition, the system’s modular construction means it can easily cater for different maintenance and condition monitoring strategies employed across different industry sectors. For example, the system is ATEX-certified and so can be used in hazardous or explosive environments and the system has a range of communications interfaces so that it can be easily integrated with a company’s existing plant management or production control and maintenance systems.

Once set up, the system can operate automatically without further intervention from the user, to measure, record, analyse and issue alerts on vibration data from rotating plant. By continuously monitoring a machine or piece of rotating equipment, FAG ProCheck can detect changes in their behaviour early and alert maintenance personnel to a potential problem before it actually occurs. Maintenance teams can therefore improve their planning and scheduling and production downtime is significantly reduced.

The FAG ProCheck system can be easily expanded and customised through a new expansion slot system and digital filter algorithms. The unit is therefore easy to integrate into a company’s existing production data management system, statistical process control (SPC) system or PLC network.

So how does it work?
The data recorded by sensors on rotating plant is subjected to initial assessment by FAG ProCheck and if defined alarm limits are exceeded, alert warnings are automatically generated and sent to defined interfaces, where they undergo further assessment. The system can be configured and adapted either by the end user customer or by Schaeffler’s maintenance and asset management service division, FAG Industrial Services (F’IS).
The stored algorithms process the data to extract the necessary information on the condition of the machine. This initial check is independent of connection to a server PC, which holds the configuration and analysis software. This means all FAG ProCheck systems in a network can operate independently of a server connection and store their data on a permanent memory medium (512MB Flash disk memory). Depending on system configuration, the data can be held locally for up to several weeks.

The system can accommodate up to 16 sensor channels plus additional analogue and digital inputs and outputs, and so can be expanded from monitoring an individual machine, right up to monitoring complete production plant systems. Multiple FAG ProCheck units can be connected to a network and managed using the same database.

FAG ProCheck uses ‘broadband parameter monitoring’ to determine changes in the overall vibration behaviour of rotating plant at an early stage, in combination with ‘selective frequency monitoring’. This is used to detect changes in the behaviour of individual components and therefore enables precise analysis of component damage.

Monitoring parameters include time and frequency domains, measuring velocity, acceleration and envelope signals, both broadband and frequency selective.

As well as vibration, further parameters such as temperature, pressure, load, speed, torque, oil status and oil quality can be recorded and correlated with the vibration data.

Communication with higher level plant systems

For communication with higher level plant operating data systems, various inputs and outputs are available. Extra signals can be received via digital or analogue inputs and used for triggering or validation of messages. They can therefore be used as ‘command’ variables for dependent signal analysis such as alarm threshold control. These signals can also be used to initiate time-controlled or event-controlled measurement tasks, for example, to control automatic data logging for specific applications. Communication with FAG ProCheck can be carried out via network (TCP/IP), serial or modem links.

The FAG ProCheck hardware was developed in collaboration with National Instruments, a leading supplier of instrumentation and measurement software and hardware.
Software is key
Successful vibration monitoring of plant depends heavily on software. As well as software for configuration and presentation of data, FAG ProCheck also offers customers a range of analysis software tools, including Trend Analysis and FFT Analysis, which is used for the precise assessment of damaged components, such as gear teeth, inner rings and outer rings.

For improved presentation of data, Waterfall diagrams are available. ‘Harmonic’ and ‘side band’ detection is also available for easy identification of different types of damage.

Customers of FAG ProCheck can receive help with installation and commissioning, systems maintenance, remote diagnosis, project planning, training and hotline technical support from FAG Industrial Services.

For a free catalogue on FAG ProCheck or for more information on FIS’ complete range of condition monitoring services, please visit www.fis-services.com or telephone the marketing department on 0121 351 3833.