Abstract
Sidebands of vibration spectrum are sensitive to the fault degree and have been proved to be useful for tooth fault detection and localization. However, the amplitude and frequency modulation due to manufacturing errors (which are inevitable in actual planetary gear system) lead to much more complex sidebands. Thus, in the paper, a lumped parameter model for a typical planetary gear system with various types of errors is established. In the model, the influences of tooth faults on time-varying mesh stiffness and tooth impact force are derived analytically. Numerical methods are then utilized to obtain the response spectra of the system with tooth faults with and without errors. Three system components (including sun, planet, and ring gears) with tooth faults are considered in the discussion, respectively. Through detailed comparisons of spectral sidebands, fault characteristic frequencies of the system are acquired. Dynamic experiments on a planetary gear-box test rig are carried out to verify the simulation results and these results are of great significances for the detection and localization of tooth faults in wind turbines.
Highlights
Planetary gear systems have been widely used in wind power systems because of the advantages of compact structure, large carrying capacity, and high transmission efficiency [1]
The tooth faults that have occurred in planetary gear systems have brought numerous troubles to wind power plants [2,3,4]
Through detailed comparisons on both numerical and experimental results, the fault characteristic frequencies can be obtained after considering the gear manufacturing errors
Summary
Planetary gear systems have been widely used in wind power systems because of the advantages of compact structure, large carrying capacity, and high transmission efficiency [1]. Lei et al [5] extracted two diagnostic parameters based on the examination of vibration characteristics of a planetary gearbox in both time and frequency domains. Chaari et al [12] studied the influence of tooth pitting and cracking on the sun gear vibration spectrum based on a planetary gear model. His research indicated that the amplitude and phase modulation of the vibration signal could indicate the difference between tooth spalling and cracking effectively. Inalpolat and Kahraman [17] developed a nonlinear time-varying dynamic model to predict modulated sidebands of a planetary gear system, and both the numerical and experimental results showed that the sidebands were greatly changed due to the amplitude and frequency modulations caused by gear errors. Dynamic experiments on a planetary gear-box test rig are carried out to verify the simulation results
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