CiiT International Journal of Artificial Intelligent Systems and Machine Learning, Vol 4, No 10, September 2012
Implementation of Locally Weighted Projection
Regression Network for Condition Monitoring of a
Steam Turbine
K. Satyanarayana, Dr.M.M.M. Sarcar and Dr.S. Purushothaman1
Abstract---Steam Turbine used in power station is a costly
system. It is used to drive generators for producing electricity.
Periodic monitoring and preventive maintenance is mandatory to
minimize heavy loss in terms of time and money. The loss can be
sudden breakage of small to large sized mechanical rotating parts due
to improper maintenance. There are many methods of identifying the
fault that prevails when the turbine is operating. However,
monitoring of vibration of rotating parts is very important as the
vibration slowly escalates to different mechanical parts leading to
failure of components.
Many statistical methods, artificial neural network algorithms,
evolutionary algorithms have been proposed by earlier researchers
especially for bearing fault identification, gas turbine condition
monitoring.
However, there are very limited publications that discusses about
implementation of ANN in condition monitoring of steam turbine.
This paper implements Locally weighted projection regression
(LWPR) which experimentally recognizes turbine bearings faults.
Wavelet coefficients are obtained from the vibration signal and used
as feature. The statistical parameters of the wavelet coefficients are
used to train the LWPR. The turbine working condition has been
categorized as good, satisfactory and bad. RBF with 5 X 7 X 1
topology has been used to classify the conditions of turbine.
Keywords---Locally Weighted Projection Regression Neural
Network, Turbine Data, Vibration
I. INTRODUCTION
C ONDITION monitoring and diagnostics of rotating
machinery is mostly based on vibration data (Chow, et al.,
1991; Alguindigue, et al., 1993; Paya, et al., 1997;
McCormick, et al., 1997,1998;). .Automated detection and
diagnosis of machine conditions by artificial neural networks
(McCormick, et al., 1997; Dellomo, 1999; Nandi, 2000;
Samanta and Al-Balushi, 2001, 2003).
Turbine supervision is an essential part of the day-to-day
running of any power plant. There are many potential faults
such as cracked rotors and damaged shafts, which result from
vibration and expansion. When this expansion and vibration is
Manuscript received on August 28, 2012, review completed on September
17, 2012 and revised on September 21, 2012.
K. Satyanarayana, Research Scholar, Mechanical Engineering, Andhra
university, Visakhapatnam - 530 003, E-Mail: satyam918@gmail.com.
Dr.M.M.M. Sarcar, Professor, Department of Mechanical Engineering,
College of Engineering, Andhra University, Visakhapatnam - 530 003, E-
Mail: mmmsarcar.mech@aucevizag.ac.in.
Dr.S. Purushothaman, Professor and Dean, Udaya School of Engineering,
India-629204, E-Mail: drsppuru@gmail.com.
Digital Object Identifier: AIML092012003.
0974-9667/CIIT–IJ-3744/04/$20/$100 © 2012 CiiT Published by the Coimbatore Institute of Information Technology
574
apparent in its early stages the problem can usually be
resolved without any of the disruption caused when a turbine
has to be shut down. By appropriate trending of the various
measurement points and the identification of excessive
vibration or movement, scheduled equipment stoppages or
outages can often be utilized to investigate and resolve the
failure mechanism.
Typical vibration measurement include: 1.Absolute
vibration of bearing pedestals, 2.Shaft vibration relative to
bearing, 3.Structural & foundation vibration monitoring,
Typical location measurement include: 1.Shaft eccentricity,
2.Differential expansion or shaft movement, 3.Valve position
on steam inlet, 4.Casing expansion, both inner and outer,
5.Speed, including over speed and zero speed and
6.Temperature
Each of the measurement techniques are used to monitor the
turbine during its operating cycle, some measurements may be
configured to provide warning alarms as well as automated
shutdown, although these systems tend to operate on a voted
principle to ensure maximum system integrity.
II. PROBLEM DEFINITION
The existing problem in diagnosing the vibration of a heavy
rotary system, there is no standard pattern of vibration signal.
Hence, new methodologies are required to identify possible
forms of different vibration patterns. Hence, we prefer to use
ANN which we believe that, it can give added strength in
diagnosing the vibration information to support a better
concrete decision.
III. METHODOLOGY
A. Wavelet decomposition
The wavelet transform (WT) was developed as an
alternative to the short time Fourier transform (STFT). A
wavelet is a waveform with limited duration that has an
average value of zero. Comparing wavelets with sine waves,
sinusoids do not have limited duration, they extend from
minus to plus infinity and where sinusoids are smooth and
predictable. Wavelet analysis is the breaking up of a signal
(James, et al., 1997; Gary, et al., 1999; Lada, et al.,
2002;Kahaei, et al., 2006; Chebil, et al., 2009) into shifted and
scaled versions of the original (or mother) wavelet. The
features are obtained from the Approximation and Details of
the 5th level of db1, by using the following equations:
CiiT International Journal of Artificial Intelligent Systems and Machine Learning, Vol 4, No 10, September 2012 575

V1=1/d ∑ (Approximation details) (1) Remove noise

Where d = Samples in a frame and Decompose by discrete wavelet (DWT) of type „db‟.
V1 = Mean value of approximation Decompose by 5 levels.
V2=1/d ∑ (Approximation or details –V1)) (2) Find feature from the approximation matrix at the 5th
Where V2=Standard Deviation of approximation level decomposition.
V3=maximum (Approximation or details) (3) With final weights of LWPR.
V4=minimum (Approximation or details) (4) Classify the vibration.
V5=norm (Approximation or Details)2 (5)
Where V5 = Energy value of frequency IV. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP AND RESULT DISCUSSION
B. Locally Weighted Projection Regression (LWPR) A. Schematic Diagram of the Vibration Acquiring
LWPR achieves better results in nonlinear function System
approximation in high dimensional spaces. It is insensitive to
redundant data. It uses linear models locally, (Sethu, et al.,
2000, 2008). Univariate regressions in selected directions are
used in the input space. The nonparametric local learning
system learns rapidly. It uses second order learning methods
based on incremental training. Weight adjustments are done
based on local information only. Training LWPR is done as
follows,
The 5 features obtained are used as inputs for the LWPR
and the target values for training each type is based on
labeling.
Input extracted features from wavelet.
Initialize LWPR using diagonal distance matrix α, norm,
meta rate and initial_λ. Many other variables can be
initialized or made constants depending upon the
requirements. Fig 1 Vibration Acquiring System Courtesy (ProvibTech)
Create random numbers.
Choose input and target output of a pattern The schematic diagram presented in Figure 1, is self
Find global mean and variance of the patterns. explanatory and a similar system is installed in the power
Normalize input and output. plant at Andhra pradesh, India. Figure 2 shows the amount of
Compute the weight. displacement obtained from the vibration display system in the
Check if new random field has to be added. power plant. Figure 3 presents the error of LWPR during
Find mean square errors between target and the estimated converence. Figure 4 presents the outputs of LWPR against
values. the target output.
Repeat steps 5 to 9 until all the patterns are presented.
C. Implementation
i. Training
Read signal
Remove noise
Decompose by discrete wavelet (DWT) of type „db‟.
Decompose by 5 levels
Find feature from the approximation matrix at the 5th
level decomposition
Label the features based on the type of vibration allowed
for the turbine.
Repeat step 1 to step 6 for different types of acceptable
and unacceptable roughness values
Train the LWPR using input and corresponding labels
obtained in previous steps.
Store the Final Weights in a File.
ii. Testing
Read vibration signal.

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CiiT International Journal of Artificial Intelligent Systems and Machine Learning, Vol 4, No 10, September 2012 576

condition estimation

45 19.5

Estimated and target Vibration limit

19 Target
40 Acc=1, Ver LWPR estimated output
tical, μm 18.5

18
35
Acc=1, Hor
17.5
izontalal, μ
30 m 17

Acc=2, Ver
Dispalcement, μm

16.5
tical, μm
25
16
0 20 40 60 80 100 120
Test pattern numbers
Acc=2, Hor
20 Fig 4 Performance of LWPR
izontalal, μ
m
V. CONCLUSION
15 Acc=3, Ver This paper shows the extraction of features form the
tical, μm vibration signal followed by training and testing using the
locally weighted projection regression network. The following
10
Acc=3, Hor conclusions are obtained.
izontalal, μ The size of the network can be as small as possible to
5 m learn the features of the non linear signal.
The LWPR network can learn huge number of patterns
Acc=4, Ver unlike other neural networks.
0 tical, μm
1
25
49
73
97

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K. Satyanarayana is working as an Associate Professor

in Mechanical Engineering in VVIT, Guntur,
Andhrapradesh, India. His areas of interests are
condition monitoring.-

Dr.M.M.M. Sarcar is the Head of the Department,

Mechanical Engineering, College of Engineering,
Andhra University, Visakhapatnam, India. He has
completed his PhD from IIT, Kharagpur in Automation.
He has produced 4 Doctorates. He has more than 20
publication to his credit. He is a member in Fellow of
Institution of Engineers (India), ISTAM and Condition
Monitoring Society of India.

Dr.S. Purushothaman completed his PhD from Indian

Institute of Technology Madras, India in 1995. He has
109 publications to his credit. He has 19 years of
teaching experience. Presently he is working as
Professor and Dean in Udaya School of Engineering,
India

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