Equipment Details:

▪ Equipment : Cooling Tower Fan

▪ Equipment Tag : CTF-2
▪ Motor Rating : 160kW, 1485 rpm
▪ Gearbox : Paharpur Geareducer
▪ Gear Ratio : 12.98
▪ Gear Shafts : Input, Intermediate Gear & Output

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 1

Problem Description:

▪ High vibration was experienced on the motor of the

cooling tower fan with the entire structure vibrating.

▪ The Mechanical manager of the site decided to

perform shaft alignment as routine alignment check
was due on the fan.

▪ Vibspectrum was requested to carryout the alignment

prior to vibration check.

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 2

Alignment Results:
As Found As Left

▪ The results indicated the spacer coupling between the

motor and gearbox shaft was misaligned.
▪ The correction was performed in the vertical axis and
brought to acceptable limits but in the horizontal axis,
the correction wasn’t possible as the motor was bolt
bound in one direction.
INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 3
Vibration Spectrum:

▪ The machine was run at full speed after the alignment

correction.
▪ High vibration still persisted on the motor with
predominant 1x peak vibration of motor rpm.
▪ Long cable was laid to capture the vibration on the
gearbox and the spectrum was dominated by 1x
running speed of the motor rpm.
▪ Balancing was advised to reduce the high 1x amplitude.
▪ It was decided to add weight on the coupling for
balancing the 1x frequency amplitude.

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 4

Vibration Spectrum after Balancing:
Before Balancing After Balancing

▪ The coupling balancing was performed and the

vibration levels on motor reduced from 21mm/s to
4.24mm/s RMS.

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 5

High Vibration on the Gearbox:

▪ The vibration on the motor side reduced but the

vibration on the gearbox was still above acceptable
limits.
▪ The high vibration was dominated by 1x peak of motor
rpm and hence again balancing was advised with
sensor mounted on the gearbox input shaft.
v rms [mm/s] G e a r b o x\ G e a r b o x D E - H o r i zo n ta l \ c t2 g d h .s r v e a s
v rms
7/ 21
[mm/s]
/ 2 0 1 6 1G
2 :0
ea 8r
:3b4
o x\
AM G e a r b o x D E - H o r i zo n ta l \ g h c t.s r v e a s 7
14
34
13
32
M
30 RPM : 1500 (25.00Hz) 12 RPM : 1500 (25.00Hz)
M(x) : 1485.00 cp m (0.99 Ord e rs) M(x) : 1500.00 cp m (1.00 Ord e rs)
28 M(y) : 30.69 mm/s M(y) : 3.82 mm/s
11
26
10
24
9
22
20

18
Before Balancing 8

7
After Balancing
16
6
14
12 5

10 4 M

8 3
6
2
4
1
2

0 0
0 5000 10000 15000 0 2000 4000 6000 8000 10000
f [cp m] f [cp m]

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 6

High Vibration on the Gearbox (Contd..):

▪ After balancing with gearbox sensor as reference, the

1x amplitude of gearbox reduced from 30mm/s to
3.24mm/s RMS.
▪ The overall vibration was still high with the entire
structure vibrating.
▪ On closely studying the spectrum, we found out that
the predominant peak of vibration was now at 540cpm
and multiple harmonics.
▪ Further analysis was carried out to identify the source
of 540 cpm frequency vibration.

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 7

Paharpur Gearbox:

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 8

Gearbox Stages and its speeds:

Input Speed, N1 - 1485 RPM

No. of Teeth on Input Pinion - 21
No. of Teeth on Intermediate shaft Gear - 58
Speed of Intermediate Shaft, N2 - 540 RPM
No. of teeth on Intermediate shaft Pinion - 20
No. of Teeth on Output Shaft - 94
Speed of Output Shaft, N3 - 115 RPM
Gearmesh Frequency for 1st Gearset - 31185 CPM
Gearmesh Frequency for 1st Gearset - 10800 CPM

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 9

Gearbox Failure??:

▪ The new peak of vibration suggested a possible gear

failure and on thorough study of the spectrums, the
peak 540cpm was co related to the intermediate gear
speed.
a o p [g ] CT F A N 2 \ G B O X IN P U T - H O R \ 1 e n v .s r a c e a 7 / 2 3 / 2 0 1 6 9 :1 1 :1 4 A M

0.34

0.32
RPM : 1500 (25.00Hz)
0.30 2 M(x) : 539.63 cp m (0.36 Ord e rs)
M(y) : 0.235 g
0.28
D(x) : 12951.00 cp m (8.63 Ord e rs)
0.26 D(y) : 0.022 g

0.24 M

0.22
0.20
4
0.18
3
0.16

0.14
10
0.12
9
0.10 13
0.08 7
6
11 16 19
0.06 14 17 20
12
0.04 2223
15 21 D
0.02 8 18
5
0.00
0 5000 10000 15000 20000
f [cp m]

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 10

Time waveform:

▪ The time waveform obtained on the gearbox indicated

peaks distinctively spaced at 540cpm.
a [g ] CT FAN 2\ G B O X IN T E R M E D IA T E - H O R \ 2 n tw .s r a c tw 7/ 23/ 2016 9 :1 6 :2 6 AM
2.5

2.0

M
1.5 D

1.0

0.5

0.0

-0.5

-1.0

-1.5
R PM : 1500 (25.00H z)
M(x) : 5437.50 ms
-2.0 M(y ) : 1.614 g
D (x) : 5548.83 ms
D (y ) : 1.342 g
-2.5
5200 5300 5400 5500 5600 5700 5800 5900
t [ms ]

▪ The sound profile from the cooling tower was compared

with that of a healthy cooling tower gearbox and
suggested clear impacts.
▪ Hence based on the above findings it was concluded to
inspect the gearbox.
INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 11
Gearbox Inspection:

▪ On inspection, the intermediate shaft pinion was found

to be severely damaged.

▪ The damage corresponds to bending fatigue damage.

The probable reasons for this kind of damage are
excessive loads or inclusions in the steel.
INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 12
Vibration spectrum after gearbox replacement :

▪ After replacement of the gearbox, the initial vibration

was still high with 1x peak of the motor running speed.
▪ Coupling balancing was carried out on both couplings
and the vibration values reduced to below 1mm/s
RMS.
v rms [mm/s] M o to r \ M IV \ 1 1 m v .s r v e a s 7 / 3 1 / 2 0 1 6 v
8 :5
rms7 :1
[mm/s]
0 AM M o to r \ M IV \ 2 j v .s r v e a s 7 / 3 1 / 2 0 1 6 4 :2 5 :5 5
0.70
34
R PM : 1500 (25.00H z) 0.65 R PM : 1500 (25.00H z)
32
M(x) : 1485.00 cp m (0.99 Ord e rs)
30 0.60 M(y) : 0.56 mm/s
M
28
0.55
26
0.50
24

22 Before Balancing 0.45 After Balancing

20 0.40

18
0.35
16
0.30
14

12 0.25

10 0.20

8
0.15
6
0.10
4
0.05
2

0 0.00
0 20000 40000 0 20000 40000
f [cp m] f [cp m]

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 13

Conclusion:

▪ The high vibration on the cooling tower was due to

failed gear.
▪ The probable reason of failure on the gear was due to
load on the gear which can be due to misalignment or
unbalance.
▪ Vibspectrum was able to capture the gear fault using
techniques as time waveform and sound profile of the
gear.
▪ The timely finding of the gear failure helped Gulf
Cement avoid catastrophic failure.
▪ The machine has been operating smoothly ever since
July 2016.
INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 14
 THANK YOU

INTERNATIONAL MACHINE VIBRATION ANALYSIS CONFERENCE | DUBAI, UAE 2017 Slide 15