Vibration monitoring of Vent fans 2

[gracealbert]

Hi everybody! Please help

I am curious of doing vibration monitoring to the vent fans that supply air in the underground. The Motor, coupling and blades are in the middle and enclosed in a long tubing (approx. 15m) open ended bothways and therefore inaccessible especially when the machine is running. The monitoring device that I use is a Microlog SKF CMVA60. Can any of you therefore please advice as to how I can achieve this at reasonable cost, effectively and efficiently.

 

[electricpete]

Monitor where you can. Rely more on trending than absolute magnitudes. Maintenance philosophy should recognize that vibration monitoring on those fans is not as effective as on other fans.

We have had a number of bearing problems on enclosed vane axial fans which we did not detect. I think we are heading toward a philosophy of more time-based maintenance on the most critical of those fans in order to compensate for lack of condition-based sensitivity... particularly for bearing problems.

There are people who sell current monitoring devices that claim they can detect a wide variety of defects similar to vibration, including unbalance, looseness, bearing problems. If it's true this is a great application. For example check out pdma.com Personally I'm waiting for this type of technology to become more mainstream and trusted before we buy it.

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[dgallagher]

There are cost effective accelerometers you could permanantly mount and terminate in an enclosure with channel selector switch and BNC interface to your Microlog.

There are also cost effective loop powered vibration transmitters that could interface directly to a PLC for cost effective continuous monitoring.

If either of these avenues are a possibility.

 

[gracealbert]

Hi dgallagher,
Thanks for your valuabale contribution. I think the first option could be made possible.