Page 8 - Industrial Technology July 2021

INDUSTRY

UPDATE...

The motor drive can play a key

role in predictive maintenance

DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION CAN
BE HARD TO JUSTIFY IN TERMS OF
INVESTMENT, BUT BLAKE GRIFFIN,
SENIOR ANALYST AT INTERACT
ANALYSIS, ARGUES THAT
PREDICTIVE MAINTENANCE
STANDS OUT AS WORTHY OF
INVESTMENT CONSIDERATION

redictive maintenance can save millions of
pounds of lost output by pre-empting production
line downtime. Researchers at Interact Analysis
Phave turned their focus on the ability of motor
drives to perform predictive maintenance diagnostics not
only on themselves, but also on the equipment they
control, potentially saving millions in machinery
downtime. This technology, whilst in its early days, is
expected to be a key enabler of predictive maintenance
initiatives as it opens up a new stream of data for both
OEMs and end-users to tap into.
Motor drives can be highly sophisticated pieces of
equipment, capable of performing diagnostics on
themselves, and giving signals to alert engineers when
maintenance is necessary, thereby avoiding breakdowns
and subsequent costly machinery downtime. Some
vendors have recognised the potential of this predictive data from third-party smart sensors, the drive vendor
maintenance technology and offer it as a service to end- would need to decide which third-party protocols they
users. would support, and what would be done with the data.
However, drives can do more than diagnostics on Also, the drive would need to be fitted with additional
themselves. For example, they can monitor the status of hardware such as a networking IC.
the motor they are controlling by measuring the voltage Where the drive can act both as a current and voltage
and current the motor requires to perform a task in real- sensor and a gateway to send more sophisticated data
time. This data is used to control torque and motor from smart sensors elsewhere to be analysed, it is most
speed, but it can also be used to identify the imminent likely the vast majority of motor failure issues would be
failure of a component in a motor. Drives vendors argue pre-empted.
that voltage and current measures give more
sophisticated insights into motor failure than the standard Applications-led
monitoring of vibration. As a general rule, the bigger the motor, the greater the
As OEMs and end-users are beginning to recognise financial loss when it stands idle for repair. We believe
the value of data housed in the smart devices driving the industries that will be first in the queue for motor combination of edge and cloud computing for predictive
their systems, some drives vendors are developing drives offering predictive maintenance capabilities will be maintenance analytics.
software for their products which are aimed at making those using the largest and most expensive machinery. Smaller-scale industries may be slower to adopt
the process of gathering, organising, and monitoring Additionally, process industries in which downtime could predictive maintenance owing to cost issues, but we can
trends in this data easier. represent the loss of a batch being manufactured are expect these operations to increase their demand for
Looking at what users can expect in terms of expected to adopt predictive maintenance early. drives that can diagnose issues on the spot, on the
predictive maintenance, it depends upon the kind of data These industries are likely to include metals, oil and motors they are controlling.
being captured, and this in turn is dependent on whether gas, water and waste-water, power, chemicals and Predictive maintenance in motor drives is a
the drive acts as a sensor, collecting and analysing data, pharmaceuticals, and various other sectors involving large technology on the move. We expect to see this industry
or as a gateway passing data on to an external network. industrial processes. As well as being the largest, they are flourish as the cost benefits become more evident in an
A motor drive acting as a sensor will monitor voltage and also some of the swiftest growing sectors in the market. industrial environment where efficiency is key. Suppliers
current and flag up potential malfunctions in the motor The potential for savings in these areas through predictive have already started working on the next generation of
equipment. It has been suggested that 70% of motor maintenance is huge. drives which incorporate predictive maintenance. These
problems could be diagnosed by the drive in this way. Automotive, another big player on the industrial drives will not only identify an issue with a motor, they
However, for reasons of cost, not all drives have landscape, has already started utilising predictive will also adjust its performance so it will keep running
voltage and current sensors, so this is not an across-the- maintenance technologies. We anticipate these larger until an engineer can fix it. For industrial drives, it
board solution. For a drive to act as a gateway, collecting industries, often with multiple sites, will use a really is a brave new world out there.

8 INDUSTRIAL TECHNOLOGY • July 2021