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A gearbox fault diagnosis method based on MKurt spectrum and CYCBD

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DOI: 10.1784/insi.2021.63.8.472

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Vol 63 | No 8
August 2021
 Official Journal of the British Institute of Non-Destructive Testing

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 DOI: 10.1784/insi.2021.63.8.472
SIGNAL ANALYSIS

A gearbox fault diagnosis method based on

MKurt spectrum and CYCBD
Xianyou Zhong, Tianwei Huang, Quan Mei, Xiang Gao and Xiao Zhao

Maximum second-order cyclostationary blind deconvolution (CYCBD) is a good signal denoising method, which can be
employed for gear fault diagnosis. However, CYCBD is highly dependent on the pre-period of the measured signal, which
needs to be appropriately predetermined. To address this issue, a new method based on the multi-point kurtosis (MKurt)
spectrum and CYCBD is proposed, which can be used for extracting fault features in a gearbox. First, deconvolution
period T, the key parameter of CYCBD, is accurately selected using the MKurt spectrum. Then, according to the selected key
parameter, CYCBD is employed to process the gearbox signals and identify the fault type. This proposed method is applied
to the analysis of single and compound fault signals of a gearbox; the large gear and pinion fault signals under strong
background noise are separated. Finally, the fault signals obtained by CYCBD are analysed using an envelope spectrum
to extract the fault features. The two case studies demonstrate that the proposed method can effectively identify the gear
faults. Moreover, the results show the superior effectiveness and reliability of this proposed method compared with the
maximum correlation kurtosis deconvolution (MCKD) method.

Keywords: fault diagnosis, MKurt spectrum, maximum second-order cyclostationarity blind deconvolution, compound fault.

1. Introduction EMD decomposition. Zheng et al[12] presented an improved EEMD

As essential parts within rotating machinery, gearboxes are widely
used and prone to failures. The fault types in gearboxes are usually
not faults of individual components, but various mutually coupled
and interfering faults[1-3]. When a fault occurs in a gearbox, the
measured vibration signal is a superposition of various source
signals, which will be attenuated during transmission. It is a
challenge to detect mechanical faults by extracting fault features
from the original signal in strong noise background, especially for
compound faults[4,5].
When a gearbox fails, the acquired gearbox signal will be mixed
with periodic impulse components and resistance compositions
during the operation of the gearbox. For gearbox fault diagnosis,
the traditional vibration diagnosis techniques include time-domain
analysis and frequency-domain analysis[6,7]. Nevertheless, the
measured gearbox fault signals are composed of non-stationary
and non-linear components, making it hard to extract the gearbox
fault features by traditional time-domain analysis and frequency-
domain analysis[8,9]. Some time-frequency analysis methods for
the identification of fault features include a wavelet transform
(WT), empirical mode decomposition (EMD), ensemble empirical
mode decomposition (EEMD), local mean decomposition (LMD),
singular spectrum decomposition (SSD), etc, and these have been
extensively used in the field of mechanical fault detection. For
instance, the WT is a typical time-frequency analysis method, but
its performance depends on the selection of a suitable wavelet basis
function, limiting its application. Based on WT and narrowband
signal analysis theory, Gilles[10] proposed a method to tackle this
problem, which is known as the empirical wavelet transform.
EMD was proposed to decompose the non-stationary signal
adaptively into a finite sum of intrinsic mode functions (IMFs).
To avoid the problem that the selection of the sensitive IMF
components is normally carried out based on the user’s experience,
Ricci and Pennacchi[11] proposed a merit index that automatically
selects the sensitive IMF components from the results of the
approach by integrating permutation entropy and EEMD, which
can effectively eliminate mode mixing. Similar to EMD, LMD can
decompose the signal into series of IMFs. Wang et al[13] proposed
a new method based on LMD and multi-scale entropy to avoid
misjudgement or missed judgement caused by improper thresholds.
Variational mode decomposition (VMD) can decompose a
measured signal into a series of band-limited modes; however, its
decomposition accuracy is often limited by the choice of the mode
number k and the bandwidth control parameter α[14]. Many scholars
have optimised these two parameters using various optimisation
algorithms, but this reduces the computational efficiency. For
example, Yi et al[15] adopted the particle swarm optimisation (PSO)
algorithm to optimise these two parameters of VMD. Yan et al[16]
proposed multivariate singular spectrum decomposition based on
the existing multi-channel method and used it for the analysis of
multi-channel data.
In recent decades, blind deconvolution (BD) techniques have
been employed for mechanical fault diagnosis. The objective of the
BD method is to devise an inverse finite impulse response filter using
the objective function method (OFM) to extract transient impulse
components from the original mechanical vibration signal. Even in
the case of an unknown linear time-invariant system, the use of a
BD approach for fault diagnosis can still achieve good results[17,18].
l Submitted 16.03.21 / Accepted 22.06.21
Xianyou Zhong is an Associate Professor with the Department of
Mechanical Engineering at the China Three Gorges University.
Tianwei Huang, Quan Mei and Xiang Gao are pursuing master’s degrees
in mechanical engineering at the China Three Gorges University.
Xiao Zhao* is a lecturer with the Department of Mechanical
Engineering at the Hubei University of Arts and Science.
*Corresponding author. Email: zhaoxiao_wust@163.com

472 Insight • Vol 63 • No 8 • August 2021

 SIGNAL ANALYSIS

Among all these BD techniques, minimum entropy deconvolution 2. Algorithm details

(MED) is the most frequently used technique for noise reduction of
vibration signals. MED deconvolutes the optimal filter to enhance 2.1 CYCBD method
some large peaks in the signal using the maximum kurtosis
The purpose of blind deconvolution is to separate the original
value as the interrupt termination condition[19,20]. Since MED
fault excitation source S0 from the collected signal x by
performs better in recovering a single large peak rather than a
constructing an inverse filter:
series of impulses, it is often used in combination with other fault
diagnosis methods to improve its fault extraction performance[21]. s = x ∗ h = ( s0 ∗ g ) ∗ h ≈ s0............................ (1)
Wang et al designed a method based on MED and EEMD to where g is the frequency response function of an unknown
extract the weak fault characteristics of bearings. However, this system, h denotes the inverse filter, s refers to the estimated fault
method can only highlight a few large spikes and cannot extract excitation source and * indicates the convolution operation.
weak component features in composite fault signals[22,23]. To The convolution operation of discrete signals can be expressed
address the shortcomings of MED, McDonald et al proposed the through the following matrix form:
maximum correlated kurtosis deconvolution (MCKD) algorithm,
s = Xh............................................ (2)
which was successfully employed for the detection of transmission
line fault features[24,25]. In MCKD, the kurtosis of signals is used ⎡ s ⎡ N − 1⎤ ⎤ ⎡ x ⎡ N − 1⎤ … x ⎡⎣0 ⎤⎦ ⎤ ⎡ h ⎡0 ⎤ ⎤
⎢ ⎣ ⎦ ⎥ ⎢ ⎣ ⎦ ⎥⎢ ⎣ ⎦ ⎥
to extract weak impulse components, which can attain the aim of ⎢ ⎥=⎢ ⎥⎢ ⎥ .... (3)
! ! ! ! !
noise reduction under low signal-to-noise ratio conditions. A few ⎢ ⎥ ⎢ ⎥⎢ ⎥
innate shortcomings also limit its performance in gearbox fault ⎢ s ⎡⎣ L − 1⎤⎦ ⎥ ⎢ s ⎡⎣ L − 1⎤⎦ … x ⎡⎣ L − N − 2 ⎤⎦ ⎥ ⎢ n ⎡⎣ N − 1⎤⎦ ⎥
⎣ ⎦ ⎣ ⎦⎣ ⎦
detection. For example, the correlated kurtosis indicator has been
where L and N are the lengths of s and h, respectively.
put forward by trial and error but its statistical properties have not
In vibration-based fault detection, cyclostationarity plays an
been studied.
essential part, which has been illustrated in that the vibration signal
MCKD has some obvious drawbacks. For instance, the periods
of rotating machinery is well simulated by the cyclostationary
of the gearbox fault signals need to be known in advance and it
processes. The actual mechanical signal is usually composed of
entails a considerable expense in terms of computation. In addition,
first-order and second-order cyclostationary processes, which
when the obtained deconvolution period is not an integral number,
are called CS1 and CS2, respectively. The CS1 section reflects the
it is necessary to reprocess the data, which can easily lead to
perfectly deterministic part of the signal, which contributes all the
misdiagnosis[26-28]. For weak fault feature extraction in a strong
periodic components. The CS2 section reflects a random signal
noise environment, the maximum second-order cyclostationary
part that shows periodic fluctuations of its energy flow. In the
blind deconvolution (CYCBD) method was presented by Marco,
cyclostationarity condition, the cyclic frequency can be regarded as
which was based on maximising the higher-order statistics and the
the frequency associated with some fluctuation of the signal energy.
cyclostationarity with the cyclostationarity index (ICS). CYCBD
For example, the frequency can be related to physical phenomena
can effectively extract weak fault components from the measured
such as gear failure and bearing failure. In this case, the cyclic
vibration signal[29,30]. Nevertheless, its performance mainly depends
frequency can be expressed as:
on the deconvolution period T, which needs to be appropriately
k
predetermined on the basis of expert experience and a priori α = ............................................. (4)
knowledge. However, under actual operating conditions, due to Ts
the presence of influencing factors such as unstable input power where k represents the sample index and Ts represents the
operation, inaccurate manufacturing or assembly, wear and tear or fault period, which is determined by the fault occurrence
even failure during equipment operation, the expected period T rate.
does not exactly coincide with the theoretical value but fluctuates The mathematical expression of the second-order ICS indicator is:
around the theoretical value within a certain range. When CYCBD 2
is set to process the gearbox fault signals with the theoretical
ICS2 =
∑ kf 0
⎡⎢ csk ⎤⎥
.................................. (5)
value of period T, the processing results may not be accurate[31]. ⎡⎢ cs0 ⎤⎥
2

Therefore, the key issue in the application of CYCBD is how to set

proper parameters to obtain the best results. j 2π
k
l 1 L−1 k
2 − j 2π l
∑
2
Based on the above discussions, this paper focuses on solving csk = s , e Ts
= s ⎡⎣ l ⎤⎦ e Ts ........ (6)
L − N + 1 l= N −1
the problem of accurate selection of the CYCBD parameters under
strong noise background. To this end, a gearbox fault diagnosis 2
s
approach is presented using CYCBD and an MKurt spectrum. cs0 = ..................................... (7)
L − N +1
The proposed method aims at maximising the second-order cyclic
stationarity and extracts weak fault feature information by setting The matrix form of Equations (6) and (7) can be written as
the fault feature cycle frequency set. The validity of the technique follows:
2
is demonstrated by gear signal analysis and comparison with other EH s
csk = ..................................... (8)
diagnostic techniques. L − N +1
The rest of this paper has been divided into the following
sections. Section 2 gives the theoretical background of the CYCBD S H S ..................................... (9)
cs0 =
method, the MKurt spectrum method and the proposed method. L − N +1
The effect of the proposed method on the experimental signals of a T
s = ⎡ s ⎡⎣ N − 1⎤⎦ ,…, s ⎡⎣ L − 1⎤⎦ ⎤ .................. (10)
2 2 2
gearbox and a comparison with other fault diagnosis methods are
⎣⎢ ⎥⎦
also detailed in Section 3. The concluding remarks of the paper are
presented in the final section. E = ⎡⎣ e1 …ek …ek ⎤⎦ ................................ (11)

Insight • Vol 63 • No 8 • August 2021 473

SIGNAL ANALYSIS

⎡ − j 2π k ( N −1) ⎤ fault period T. The multi-point kurtosis (M) can be written as

⎢ e Ts ⎥ follows: 2 4
⎢ ⎥ ⎛ N−L 2 ⎞ ⎛ N−L ⎞
ek = ⎢ ! ⎥ .............................. (12) ⎜⎝ ∑ t n⎟ ⎜ ∑ t y
⎠ ⎝ n=1 n n ⎟⎠ .......................... (18)
⎢ − j 2π Tk ( L−1) ⎥ M=
n=1

⎢ e s
⎥ N−L
⎛ N−L 2 ⎞
4
⎣ ⎦
∑ n ⎜⎝ ∑ n ⎟⎠
t 8
y
n=1 n=1
From Equations (6) and (7), Equation (5) can be expressed as:
2H 2 When the MKurt reaches its maximum value, the corresponding
s EE H s number of sampling points is the fault period of the signal. The
ICS2 = .............................. (13)
2
sH s spectral peaks that correspond to integral times that are half, one-
third or quarter times the period in the MKurt spectrum will be
From Equation (13), it can be found that the signal named significantly higher than other positions, so the accurate value of
P[|s|2] contains the periodic component of |s|2, corresponding the fault period can be obtained by comparing the multiple relations
to all the cyclic frequencies of interest k, which can be described between the peak value and the theoretical value[33]. The primary
as: period (T) cannot be selected using the MKurt spectrum only once,
( )
2
1 EE H s
∑ because the peaks in the primary period are usually not the highest
2
P ⎡⎣ S ⎤⎦ = e e H
s = .......... (14)
L − N +1 k k k L − N +1 and are easily submerged by other irrelevant lines, especially for
composite faults.
After a simple operation, Equations (2) and (14) are substituted
into Equation (13) and the final result is obtained: 2.3 The proposed method
H
f X WXf f R XWX f .................... (15)
H H
Figure 1 shows the flowchart of this approach based on the
ICS2 = H H = H
f X Xf f R XX f MKurt spectrum and CYCBD. First, based on the functional
parameters and the fault characteristic period of the device, all
where RXWX and RXX are the weighted correlation matrix and the
fault characteristic frequencies and fault feature periods can be
correlation matrix, respectively. The weighted matrix W reads:
calculated. Then, the original signals are processed using the MKurt
⎡ ! 0 ⎤
spectrum algorithm. The MKurt spectrum of the signal is used to
⎛ P⎡ s 2 ⎤⎞ P

⎢⎣ ⎥⎦ ⎟ ⎢ ⎥ ( L − N + 1) 2 correct the pre-estimated fault period T to obtain the accurate fault

⎜ sH s ⎟ (
⎜ L − N + 1) = .... (16)
2
W = diar ⎢ s ⎡⎣ l ⎤⎦ ⎥
⎢ ⎥
P
period. The noise in the fault signal is reduced by CYCBD with this
! ⎥ ∑ l= N −1
⎜⎝ ⎟⎠ L−1
ss 2
⎢⎣ 0 ⎦ period. Finally, the noise-reduced signal is analysed by the envelope
spectrum to identify the gear fault.
where |s|2 is a generalised Rayleigh quotient.
f = R XX fλ ....................................... (17)
From the property of the generalised Rayleigh quotient, it
can be known that the key to ensuring that ICS2 reaches the
maximum value is required for the maximum eigenvalue λ of the
generalised Rayleigh quotient. The maximum eigenvalue λ and the
corresponding eigenvector f can be obtained by iteration and f is the
optimal filter of CYCBD. The steps to find the optimal filter f can be
summarised as follows:
Step 1: Initialise the filter f.
Step 2: The filtered output signal Y is calculated by the input signal
x and f.
Step 3: Calculate the filter f corresponding to the maximum
eigenvalue λ according to Equation (12).
Step 4: If the ΔICS2 > ε after filtering, return to Step 2 and continue
the loop. Otherwise, the iteration stops and the loop exits.
The iteration error ε is the termination condition of the
iteration.

Continue within the same loop; otherwise, stop this iteration[30].

2.2 MKurt spectrum

The multi-point optimal minimum entropy deconvolution
adjusted (MOMEDA)[32] technique can select the optimal filter
without an iterative process. It does not need to consider the
influence of parameters such as integer fault period and filter
length on this method. For the compound gearbox fault diagnosis,
since there will be numerous fault characteristic periods in the
fault signal, it may not be possible to highlight all weak fault Figure 1. Flowchart of the proposed method based on the MKurt
characteristics accurately using the MOMEDA method only spectrum and CYCBD
once. Therefore, the MKurt spectrum is adopted to identify the

474 Insight • Vol 63 • No 8 • August 2021


3. Experimental verification The MKurt spectrum of the pitting fault signal of the large gear
To validate the effectiveness of the proposed approach in fault
diagnosis, a single-fault gear signal and a compound-fault gear
signal were analysed separately.
3.1 Case study 1
The single-failure gear experiment was conducted on a QPZZ-II
test-bench. The gearbox failure test stand mainly consists of a
variable speed drive motor, a gearbox, a magnetic powder brake
and a coupling, as shown in Figure 2. The gearbox is a single-stage
transmission with a pinion on the main shaft and a large gear on
the driven shaft. The wear failure of the gearbox is simulated by
machining several small circular grooves on the tooth surface of
the large gear.
Figure 2. The gearbox test-bench
The vibration signal was measured at a sampling frequency
of 5120 Hz and a rotational speed of 880 r/min. The theoretical
characteristic frequency of the large gear is 10.72 Hz and the
theoretical failure period T is 486. The meshing frequency of
the gear is calculated as 803.92 Hz. When the magnetic powder
brake was unloaded, the gear fault signal was measured using an
acceleration sensor.
The time-domain waveform of the gear fault signal is presented
in Figure 3. There are some obvious fault impulse components in
the signal but the accurate fault characteristic period is difficult to
identify.
Figure 3. Waveform of the gear fault signal
Envelope demodulation of the single-fault signal (Figure 4)
reveals that the peak at the characteristic frequency fr of the large
gear is obvious, while the multiplicative characteristics of this
gear are buried by the irrelevant frequency components. This
result indicates that gear faults are not identified well by envelope
demodulation alone.
Figure 4. Envelope spectrum of the gear fault signal
Insight • Vol 63 • No 8 • August 2021
SIGNAL ANALYSIS
is displayed in Figure 5. It can be observed that the multi-point
kurtosis is expressed as the peaks of the fault period and the integral
multiples of the period during the process of searching. The values
corresponding to the peaks are counted and the period values can be
selected. The peaks at the fault cycle [239, 717, 1193] are prominent,
corresponding to [0.5T, 1.5T and 2.5T], respectively. The peak at the
period of 478 is also obvious, which is close to the theoretical failure
period. From the above analysis, the accurate period T is 478 and
then the accurate period is used as a preset parameter for CYCBD
to denoise the gear vibration signal. The envelope spectrum of the
denoised signal obtained by CYCBD is shown in Figure 6, from
which the characteristic frequency fr and its multiple harmonics can
be clearly observed. Thus, the effectiveness of the proposed method is
verified.
Figure 5. MKurt spectrum of the gear fault signal
Figure 6. Envelope spectrum of the gear fault signal obtained by
CYCBD
3.2 Case study 2
The standard dataset from the GOTIX project[34] was employed
for gearbox compound fault analysis. The test-bench, shown in
Figure 7, consists of two driving shafts connected via a spur gear
set. The induction motor drives the input shaft and the output
shaft is fixed rigidly to a DC generator, which is controlled by a
DMV 2342 three-phase controller. The fault types include a large
gear with pitting and a case of pinion wear. The sampling frequency
(fs) of the experiment was 25,600 Hz and the transmission ratio was
3.8. The fault characteristic frequency of the pinion was calculated
as 7.9 Hz and the fault characteristic frequency of the large gear
was 30 Hz.
Figure 7. Test-bench of the gearbox
475
SIGNAL ANALYSIS

at frequencies of 30 Hz, 60 Hz, 90 Hz, 120 Hz and 150 Hz, which

Table 1. Main parameters of the test-bench and calculation correspond to the fault characteristic frequency of the large gear and
formula of correlation its double, triple, quadruple and quintuple, respectively. The peak
values at the fault characteristic frequency of the pinion and the large
Symbol Bearing parameters Values
gear are very obvious, which verifies the effectiveness of the method.
Z1 Number of pinion teeth 15
Z2 Number of large gear teeth 57
fr1 (Hz) Frequency of input shaft rotation 7.9
fr2 Frequency of output shaft rotation 30
fi Fault period of pinion 3240
fo Fault period of large gear 853
fs Sampling frequency 25,600
Figure 11. Envelope spectrum of the pinion signal obtained by
n Motor speed 480
CYCBD
Figure 8 displays the time-domain waveform of the compound
fault signal, which shows that the fault impulse is not obvious and
the fault impulse feature period is also difficult to identify. Only fr1
and 2fr2 can be identified from the spectrum in Figure 9 and no
other relevant and important information of the fault characteristics
can be identified. An MKurt spectrum for the composite fault
signal is obtained and the spectrum is presented in Figure 10. The
peaks at [239, 425, 1617] are more prominent, corresponding to
[0.25T, 0.5T, 2T] of the failure period; the peak at 851 is also
obvious. The actual deconvolution period of the large gear is 851, Figure 12. Envelope spectrum of the large gear signal obtained by
so, in the same way, the actual period T of the pinion is 3234. The CYCBD
accurate period is used as a preset parameter for CYCBD to denoise
the gear vibration signal, respectively, and the envelope spectrum
can be obtained. To further verify the effectiveness of the proposed technique,
it is compared with the MCKD approach. Compared with other
cyclic recursive methods such as EMD, MCKD demonstrates better
robustness and is more effective in extracting multi-fault features.
The same experimental signals are denoised by MCKD and the
proposed method, respectively. The obtained deconvolution periods
of the pinion and the large gears are used as the preset parameters
of MCKD, respectively, and its other parameters are obtained using
Figure 8. Waveform of the compound fault signal a priori knowledge to perform noise reduction on the gear signals.
The envelope spectra of the MCKD noise-reduced composite fault
signals are given in Figures 13 and 14, respectively.

Figure 9. Envelope spectrum of the compound fault signal

Figure 13. Envelope spectrum of the large gear signal obtained
using the MCKD method

Figure 10. MKurt spectrum of the compound fault signal

Figure 11 shows that the spectral lines in the envelope spectrum
are clearly visible at 7.8 Hz, 15.6 Hz, 23.4 Hz, 31.2 Hz and 39 Hz,
corresponding to the characteristic frequencies of the pinion and
its double, triple, quadruple and quintuple, respectively. Also, in
Figure 12, the envelope spectrum can separate the components
Figure 14. Envelope spectrum of the pinion signal obtained using
the MCKD method
From Figure 13, only the characteristic frequencies fr1 and
5fr1 of the pinion and the characteristic frequency 2fr2 of the
large gear can be extracted. Figure 14 shows that only limited

476 Insight • Vol 63 • No 8 • August 2021


characteristic frequency information can be seen. Compared with
the proposed method based on the MKurt spectrum and CYCBD,
the fault features extracted by this method have more adequate fault
information in the envelope spectrum.
4. Conclusions
The paper has originated from studies on the multi-point kurtosis
spectrum and CYCBD analysis. In light of the shortcomings of
CYCBD in extracting fault features of the gearbox fault signals, a
method is proposed to obtain the deconvolution period of CYCBD
using the MKurt spectrogram. The performance of the method
proposed in this paper was verified by single-fault and compound-
fault signal analysis and comparison with the MCKD approach. The
conclusions are as follows:
l MKurt can identify the impulse period from the original
fault signal. The strong background noise has no influence on
the existence of numerous peaks in the multi-point kurtosis
spectrum. The deconvolution period of CYCBD can be obtained
adaptively based on this feature.
l The proposed method based on the MKurt spectrum and
CYCBD overcomes the drawback that the CYCBD method
requires an empirical finding about the deconvolution period of
the measured vibration signal.
l The method is also employed for the diagnosis of single and
compound faults in gearboxes and comparison with the MCKD
method indicates the effectiveness of the method in gearbox
fault diagnosis.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank Dr Nadine Martin from the
GIPSA-lab for providing data measurements from the GOTIX test-
bench designed for characterisation of defects on electrically driven
mechanical systems. This work was supported by the National
Natural Science Foundation of China (number 51975324), the
Hubei Key Laboratory of Hydroelectric Machinery Design and
Maintenance (number 2020KJX11) and the Hubei Superior and
Distinctive Discipline Group of ‘Mechatronics and Automobiles’
(number XKQ2021033).
Conflicts of interest
The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare that are relevant
to the content of this article.
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21 Webinar Week
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