Lifetime Prediction for Bearings in Induction Motor

Shu-Tzu Chang Meng-Kun Liu* Chen-Yang Lan

Department of Mechanical Engineering Department of Mechanical Engineering Department of Mechanical Engineering
National Taiwan Univeristy of Science National Taiwan Univeristy of Science National Taiwan Univeristy of Science
and Technology and Technology and Technology
Taipei, Taiwan Taipei, Taiwan Taipei, Taiwan
ss850624@gmail.com mkliu@mail.ntust.edu.tw jimmylan@mail.ntust.edu.tw

Wei-Ting Hsu
Department of Mechanical Engineering
National Taiwan Univeristy of Science
and Technology
Taipei, Taiwan
m10703432@mail.ntust.edu.tw

Abstract— Induction machines are commonly used in the stages, the early stage and the later stage. At the early stage,
industrial applications. They require continuous monitoring to the growth of the RMS value and the magnitude of the
prevent the premature failure, of which bearing faults account characteristic frequency could be approximated by a linear
for most of the causes. The bearings in the rotary equipment regression model, while at the later stage, it is more closed to
tend to suffer fatigue failures during certain conditions such as
an exponential regression model [5]. As a result, we used the
load variation or electrical discharge. The fault detection based
on the vibration analysis could be found in lots of previous linear regression model to approximate the vibration
literatures, and the frequency spectrum was usually adopted to amplitude and used the mean square error of the model as the
identify the fault characteristic frequency. However, previous indicator to predict the bearing fault.
method could only detect the occurrence of bearing faults
rather than making the prediction. Hence in this study, the II. RESEARCH METHODS
time and frequency features were extracted to construct 1. Fault Characteristic Frequency
regression models to predict the development of the bearing
faults. The fault characteristic frequencies can be derived from
the geometry of the bearing and the rotation speed. A gradual
Keywords—AC induction motor, vibration signature analysis, deterioration of the parts could make the fault frequency
fault detection, feature selection. become prominent on the frequency spectrum. Four bearing
fault characteristic frequencies could be calculated as follows.
I. INTRODUCTION
Three phase induction motors are commonly used in the  Train or Cage Frequency
industry, and the fault diagnosis of them becomes more and
more important. Normally, the failures of an induction motor 1  DB cos   
FFTF  FR 1  
can be divided into several categories. Among them, 40% 2  DP 
belongs to bearing fault, 38% belongs to stator problem, 10% (1)
belongs to rotor problem and 12% belongs to others [1].  Ball Pass Frequency Outer Race
Bearings play a main role during the lifetime of the motor,
and it also causes the majority of the failure. Therefore N B  DB cos   
FBPFO  FR 1  
lifetime prediction of the bearing becomes crucial. If the 2  DP 
failure happens suddenly, it not only stops the motor but also (2)
affects the whole manufacturing system, hence causing  Ball Pass Frequency Inner race
enormous loss. To predict the bearing fault, time domain
analysis is an effective way to determine whether the bearing N B  DB cos   
FBPFI  FR 1  
fault is growing. The time domain analysis of the bearing 2  DP 
under fatigue destruction caused by electrical discharge (3)
showed that the bearing fault evolves with time and it can be  Ball Spin Frequency
seen from the amplitude of the vibration [2]. However, the
information from time domain is not enough to identify DP  D2 cos2   
FBSF  FR 1  B 2 
which parts in the bearing cause the vibration amplitude to 2DB  DP  (4)
rise. If a pit emerges on the outer ring of the bearing, it
produces an impulse when the ball passes through the pit on Where FR is the rotation frequency of the shaft in
the ring. Same problem also occurs in the inner ring and the hertz; DB is the Ball diameter; θ is the contact angle; NB is
ball itself [3][4]. Therefore, the characteristic frequency can
the number of balls and DP is the pitch diameter.
be identified on the frequency spectrum. The rising trend of
the features extracted from the time and frequency domains 2. Cumulative Moving Average(CMA)
could indicate the development of bearing fault. In the Moving average is a well-known approach and it is
experiment, the life period of the bearing could be reflected commonly used for the analysis of successive data.
by the root mean square (RMS) value of the vibration signal. Cumulative moving average is a method that considers both
We found that the bearing life could be divided into two the oldest set and the newest set to calculate the whole

XXX-X-XXXX-XXXX-X/XX/$XX.00 ©20XX IEEE

978-1-5386-8500-6/19/$31.00 ©2019 IEEE 467
average. To sum up, CMA is the indication of the cumulative For the first data set, we can calculate the original estimation
average value. from equation (11). When y 2 is imported, the model can be
3. Mean Square Error (MSE) modified using the equation below.
Mean Square Error is an indication about the average of xˆk 1  xˆk  K k 1 (y k 1  H k 1 xˆ k )
the squares of the errors, which is defined as the difference (15)
between the measurement point and the estimated point. For Where
our case, we use MSE to construct the regression model.
1 N K k 1  Pk 1 H KT 1Wk 1
MSE 
N
 (yˆ i  yi )2
i 1
(16)
(5) P 1 1 T
 P  H Wk 1 H k 1
k 1 k k 1 (17)
ŷ
Where i is the estimated value from model, yi is the
measurement value for data point i, and N is the data points x̂ k is the estimation from the original data set, and y k 1 the
number.
new data set(in this case y 2 ), xˆk +1 the updated estimation
4. Linear Least Square value from new data set.
The square sum of the residual error can be written as
1 T
J e e III. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP
2 (6)
The error is the difference between the measured point value Fig. 1 shows the equipment we used to conduct the bearing
and the estimated value. discharge failure experiment.
e  y  yˆ  y  Hxˆ (7) A B C D E
Where H is the basis matrix and it is used to substitute the
error into equation (6). The matrix calculus differentiation is
used to find the minimum J. The Jacobian of J is given by
 J 
 xˆ 
 1
 xˆ J      H T Hxˆ  H T y  0
 
 J 
 xˆn  F
G
(8) Fig.1 Setup of the experiment
The Hessian of J is given by Where A is the 3 phase induction motor; B is the torque
2 2 J meter; C and D are the bearing housing; E is the magnetic
 xˆ J  T
 HTH particle brake; F is the rotary encoder, and G is the discharge
xˆxˆ (9) wire.
To calculate the minimum J, the Hessian of J should be
positive definite. If it is strictly positive definite, equation (8) TABLE I. SPECIFICATION TABLE
can be written as
Equipment Specification
xˆ  (HT H)1 H T y (10)
3 phase squirrel cage induction TECO. AEHF type 1HP 4 poles
motor
The x̂ in equation (10) can be used to minimize J. Variable Frequency Drive (VFD) Schneider ATV312
Tachometer SU-07X
Considering the weight of the data, the equation becomes: Magnetic power brake ZKB010AA
xˆ1  (H1T W1H1 ) 1 H1T W1 y1 (11)
Torque transducer DR-2477-P
Accelerometer NSK 6204T1XAZZ#CM
We can use the line equation to estimate our linear model.
We used a 3-phase induction motor as the actuator. The
y   x   (12) motor’s rotation speed is controlled by VFD which is set at
60Hz, and the torque transducer can be used to measure the
5. Linear Sequential Estimation
torque transmitted from the shaft. Magnetic powder brake
If we want to monitor the motor condition online, the provides the torque to reduce the speed of the motor, and the
data is no longer a batch and it will continue to be imported. load can be controlled by a given current. There are two
Thus, we can use linear sequential estimation to calculate. accelerometers installed in different directions, vertical and
Assume there are two subsets, one is the original data set y1 horizontal. They can be used to measure the vibration from
and another one is the newly imported data set y 2 . both directions. The specification of the equipment and the
bearing are shown in Table I and Table II respectively.
y1  [y 11 y 12  y 1m1 ]T (13) TABLE II. BEARING SPECIFICATION
y 2  [y 21 y 22  y 2 m1 ]T (14) 6204-T1 Bearing

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 Components parameter
Outer diameter (DO)
Inner diameter(DI)
Pitch diameter(DP)
Ball diameter(DB)
Number of balls(NB)
Contact angle(θ)
Size(mm) was too big to process, the RMS of the vibration amplitude
47 within a period of 10 seconds was recorded every ten
20
33.5
minutes. The RMS of the vibration amplitude is illustrated in
8 Fig. 3. It could be seen that the RMS value varied with time
8 and kept increasing until the threshold was reached.
0

The current of the magnetic particle brake was fixed

around 3.2A to maintain the stable loading. In order to
accelerate the bearing wear, the discharge wire is attached to
the bearing housing to generate the electrical discharge effect.
Therefore the bearing was damaged gradually and it is more
similar to the real world scenario. The setting of the
experiment is shown in Table III.

TABLE III. PARAMETER SETTING

Variable Frequency Drive(VFD) 60Hz

Vibration Alarming setting 25g
Motor current 3.2A
Discharge Voltage 16.7V Fig.3 RMS of vibration amplitude in the virtical direction
Discharge Current 6A
2) Characteristic Frequency of Bearing Faults
From the equation (2)~(4) and the bearing specification
shown in the previous section, we calculated the
IV. EXPERIMENTAL RESULT AND DISCUSSION characteristic frequencies of the bearing faults, as shown in
1. Analysis Flow Chart Table IV.
The analysis flow chart of this study is shown in Fig. 2. TABLE IV. CHARACTERISTIC FREQUENCY
Four features were extracted from the time and the
Component Characteristic Frequency
frequency domains of the vibration signal. They are time
Inner Ring 142(Hz)
domain RMS, magnitude of bearing inner ring frequency,
magnitude of bearing outer ring frequency, and magnitude Outer Ring 87(Hz)
of the bearing ball frequency. Two procedures were Ball 113(Hz)
evaluated respectively. For the first scenario, the cumulative
By applying fast Fourier Transform, we found out that
moving average was applied to each feature directly to
the frequency related to inner ring, outer ring and ball
estimate the development of each feature. For the second
characteristic frequency will increase with time. However,
scenario, The MSE of the linear regression model of each
the value fluctuates even more. This problem becomes
feature was used instead. The cumulative moving average
serious at the later stage, and the difference between the
was then applied to eliminate the local variation of the MSE.
early and later stage is obvious. Thus, we need to develop
models to represent the increasing trend of these features.
3. Model Development
1) Cumulative Moving Average(CMA)
Although the feature kept fluctuating, its average still
increased with time. Therefore, the moving average was used
to alleviate the variation and estimate the uprising trend of
the feature. The detailed explanation is illustrated in Fig. 4.
Y1 Y2 Y3 Y4

a1 Average value1

a2 Average value2

a3 Average value3

Fig.4 Cumulative Moving Average

Where Y could be time domain RMS, magnitude of inner

ring frequency, magnitude of outer ring frequency, and
Fig. 2 Flow chart of the experiment magnitude of bearing ball frequency. When the new data set
2. Feature Exraction was imported, all the previous data was included to calculate
the mean value of the signal. The direct application of
1) RMS of Time Domain Signal
The development of bearing wear can be easily seen from cumulative moving average of each feature is shown in Fig.
the vibration signal in the time domain. Because the raw data 5.

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Fig.5 CMA of the (a)Time RMS (b) Inner ring frequency (c) Outer ring Fig.8 MSE of the (a)Time RMS (b) Inner ring frequency (c) Outer ring
frequency(d) Ball frequency frequency(d) Ball frequency

2) CMA of the Mean Square Error

Firstly, the linear sequential estimation was applied to
calculate the mean square error between the estimated data
and the measured data. When the new data was imported, the
model was updated simultaneously. The mean square error
was then calculated for every updates. The procedure is
illustrated in Fig. 6. Where Y could be time domain RMS,
magnitude of inner ring frequency, magnitude of outer ring
frequency, and magnitude of bearing ball frequency.
4. Prediction
The CMA was applied to the features and the MSE of the
features respectively. An evaluation criterion was applied to
the CMA data to determine if an alarm should be raised, as
shown in Fig. 9. Three conditions need to be met to raise and
alarm. First, the CMA data needs to keep increasing for five
consecutive data points. Second, the current value of CMA
data should be larger than the previous values. Third, The
mean value of the current data must be larger than the mean
value of the current data.

Fig.6 The calculation of MSE

An example to calculate MSE is shown in Fig. 7. There were

90 data points overall and the model was updated for every
30 data points. It could be observed that the data becomes
more diverse with the development of the bearing wear and
was unable to be estimated by the linear model. Hence the
MSE of the leaner sequential model developed for each
feature could be used to predict the bearing status, as shown
in Fig. 8.

Fig.9 Evaluation Criterion

An example is illustrated in Fig. 10. At the early stage of

the bearing wear, its CMA value oscillates and slowly
increases. After applying the evaluation criterion, the alarm
will be raised at the later stage and reflects the development
of the bearing wear.
Fig.7 MSE of the linear model

470
 generate a continuously increasing trend. By applying the
evaluation criterion to the trend, the alarm could be raised
Alarm correctly at the early stage of the bearing wear.

False Alarm

Fig.10 The alarm condition

The evaluation criterion was applied to the CMA of four

features respectively to determine if an alarm should be
raised. The prediction result could be seen in Fig. 10. It
could be seen that for most the features, the alarm was
raised at the relatively late stage, and the alarm was
intermittent and couldn’t reflect the deterioration of the
bearing status.
Fig.12 Prediction from the Cumulative Moving Average of the Mean Square
Error of (a)Time RMS (b) Inner ring frequency (c) Outer ring frequency(d)
Ball frequency

VI. REFERENCES
[1] Thomson, William T., and Mark Fenger. "Current signature analysis
to detect induction motor faults." IEEE Industry Applications
Magazine 7.4 (2001): 26-34
[2] Ting Syun Huang, “Data science for remaining useful life prediction
and predictive maintenance of electric motor”, 2018.
[3] Schoen, Randy R., et al. "Motor bearing damage detection using
stator current monitoring." IEEE transactions on industry applications
31.6 (1995): 1274-1279.
[4] Jhih-Jhong Chen, “Vibration Signature Analysis of Induction Motor
Driven Machinery”, 2018.
[5] John L.Crassidis,John L.Junkins, “Optimal estimation of dynamic
systems second edition,2011.

Fig.11 Evaluation of the CMA of (a)Time RMS (b) Inner ring frequency (c)
Outer ring frequency(d) Ball frequency

On the other hand, the evaluation criterion was applied to

the CMA of the MSE related to four selected features, as
shown in Fig. 12. The alarms were all raised at early stages
and they continuously existed with the development of the
bearing wear. Hence it is a better solution to predict the
bearing status at the early stages.

V. CONCLUSION
The vibration signal generated by bearing wear was
measured and predicted in this study. The features such as
time domain RMS and bearing fault characteristic
frequencies were extracted from the vibration signal. In order
to prevent the false alarm, two methods were applied to these
features. One applied CMA to the feature directly, while the
other applied CMA to the MSE of the linear model generated
by these features. It was found that all the features deviate
from the prediction of their linear model with the
development of the bearing wear. Hence the second method
which applied CMA to the MSE of the linear model could

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