Mechanical Condition Monitoring

Beyond tube leaks, some of the boiler's supporting equipment is susceptible to failure as well.

For some rotating assets and the processes associated with them, periodic route-based data collection is insufficient to indicate asset health. Online condition monitoring provides the frequency and types of data necessary to stay on top of developing issues during normal operations and to respond quickly to sudden changes during transient conditions.

For example, rotating equipment such as your forced draft (FD), induced draft (ID) and primary air (PA) fans, are critical for ensuring reliable operations. Neglecting maintenance of rotating equipment contributes to forced outages.

Deploying 24/7 online asset condition monitoring reveals performance problems long before they impact operations and is a must for any modern plant.

For rotating assets, the most effective data collection is bearing and casing vibration readings with typical data collection once per month. But for some assets and the processes associated with them, this approach is insufficient to characterize the asset or the process health. Not knowing the moment-to-moment state of particular assets and processes could result in an unscheduled failure that brings the process to a halt, causing lost productivity.

Online monitoring provides frequent measurements 24/7 so you are “always aware” of asset health. Online monitoring is always in place and ready to collect data, especially during transitional states such as start-ups, commissioning, and ramping the plant up or down. Online measurements are collected from permanently installed sensors to provide more accurate, repeatable measurement

Emerson’s AMS 6500 Machinery Health Monitor is a versatile, scalable balance of plant prediction system that can be deployed in a variety of configurations to deliver online condition monitoring exactly as needed for the application.