Condition Monitoring Technologies

[Pierre Gautreau 3]

Hi All, 

As we know, there is a surge of new predictive technologies emerging in the industry now that sensors are getting cheaper. Some plants are maintaining their antiquated programs due to the high investment costs they had to make in previous decades. One of my past workplace spends significant amounts to build a dedicated server room for online vibration monitoring dating back to the 90's!

I am now at a crossroad between investing more in this old technology or accepting the sunk cost of the old and moving forward with the new. A friend of mine introduced me to ITT's i-Alert2 Vibration sensor recently. The sensor is battery operated, transfers data through Bluetooth 4.0  and doesn't require any IT infrastructure other than an iPhone to capture the data. Furthermore a sensor cost a little under $400 CAD. 

I would be interested to hear any experiences you guys have had with this new wave of technology. I'm skeptical of anything cheap as the accuracy or reliability may not be worth it. Has anyone here used something like the ITT i-Alert2 sensor?

https://www.ittproservices.com/Our-Services/Aftermarket-Products/Monitoring/i-ALERT2-condition-monitor/

Thanks for sharing!

Pierre

[Erik Hupje 83]

HI Pierre, I'm not familiar with ITT's products or solutions but there are many providers on the market. I actually believe that with the advent of IIoT the sensors will really become commoditized (and therefore cheap!) and the real value and differentiation will come from the analysis platforms that vendors provide e.g. analysis capabilities, exception reporting, machine learning etc.

But I think you would do well for now by being cautious with venturing into cheap sensors especially for have high value / high criticality equipment. But maybe for low criticality fans etc, this could be a great option. Try a few out?

[Narender Kumar 6]

Dear Pierre

I have used these sensors. They can be a good & cheap alternative to equipment which you would like to have an eye on regular basis. You will get a vibration trend & you will be able to do the needful if trend is on UP. Moreover, it will give you a visual red LED if vibration is high even if you do not have an iphone to check visually. The less cost makes it a good alternative.

BUT

• They gives you data in mm/s so you can't do analysis with this(I do not know otherwise)
• The battery last for 2-3 yrs
• It's a single axis sensor so you will not get data in 3 axis

Please feel free to discuss further if needed.

Regards

 

[Jim Vantyghem 42]

Hello Pierre,

I remember back in the early 90's, SKF had a vibration software application  linked with various sensors to monitor bearing vibration and heat. Of course the cost was vastly expensive and thus easily dismissed.

Despite this, I thought this technology, coupled to an alarm system via some type of data link to trigger something simple as a work order, would be greatly advantageous to us especially for those hard to get locations.

I will definitely check out the sensors via your link. 

Thanks for sharing the information.

Jim

 

[Shailin 4]

Hi Pierre, Great question. I am now doing some research for a company in Condition Based Maintenance. For this, I am looking into available Condition monitoring techniques and systems. The research focusses on the implementation of CBM ( Condition based maintenance) in the rolling stock branch. If anyone has some systems they would recommend that can be used to monitor the condition of rolling stock please leave a reply below. 

Till now I have found some sensors from SKF and also from Australian rail technology. The company is a leading company in the railway sector in the Netherlands so they have some previous knowledge of CBM and thus its not a new company.