Valve_Spring_Fault_Detection_Final_1.pdf

Abstract—The article presents problems related to vibration

diagnostics in reciprocating compressors. This paper presents

the evaluation of several techniques of the digital signal processing,

such as the spectrum calculation with the Discrete Fourier

Transform (DFT), Continuous Wavelet Transform (CWT), Segmented

Analysis for detection the spring failure in reciprocating

compressor valve with the help of the vibration monitoring. The

experimental investigation to collect the data from the compressor

with both the faultless valve and the valve with spring

failure was conducted. Three 112DV1 vibration acceleration

probes manufactured by TIK were mounted on the cylinder

of the compressor. The keyphasor probe was mounted on the

compressor’s flywheel. The signal of the vibration acceleration

probe mounted on the top of the cylinder was used for the

Condition Monitoring and Fault Detection of the valve. The

TIK-RVM system of monitoring and data acquisition was used

for gathering the signal samples from the probes. The sampling

frequency was 30193.5 Hz, signal length was 65535 samples. To

imitate the spring fault, the exhaust valve spring was replaced by

the shortened one with the same stiffness. As it can be seen from

the signal processing results in the article, the techniques used

are showing quite different results for the cases of the normal

valve spring and the short one. It seems what for this type of

the compressor and valve, the valve spring failure can be quite

reliably detected with the help of the vibration monitoring. To

see if this is a case for other compressor types and other valve

types, the additional experiments are needed.