SRI KRISHNADEVARAYA ENGINEERING COLLEGE :: GOOTY

PRODUCTION

VIBRATION ANALYSIS OF HYBRID CERAMIC BALL BEARNIGS

Prepared By: P.G. CHANDRA, ID. No. 07G81A0307, pgchandra2008@yahoo.com Mechanical Engineering, S.K.D. College of Engineering, Gooty. Mobile: 9292709760. G. SIVANANDA ID. No. 07G81A0340 sivaurs_2008@yahoo.com Mechanical Engineering, S.K.D. College of Engineering, Gooty. Mobile: 9959412624.

ABSTRACT
Now a days everyone serious about performance is using Ceramic Ball Bearings. The intelligence of more Research Centre has developed a new Hybrid Bearing Test evaluate the performance of sensors and algorithms in predicting failures of rolling element bearing for aeronautics and space applications. The failure progression of both conventional and hybrid (Ceramic Rolling Elements, Metal Races) bearings can be tested from fault initiation to total failure. The effects of different lubricants on bearing life can also be evaluated. Test conditions monitored and recorded during the test include load, oil temperature, vibration and oil debris. New diagnostic research instrumentation will also be evaluated for hybrid bearing damage detection. This paper summaries analysis of the vibration all characteristics of ball bearings the comparison study of steel / hybrid ceramics.

Table of Contents :
1. 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 2. 2.1 2.2 2.3 3. 3.1 INTRODUCTION What is a Ceramic Hybrid Ball Bearing? Features Technical Charts Limitations LITERATURE OF BALL BEARINGS Bearings for Machine Tool Spindles Beyond Spindle Bearings Identification Marking Methods VIBRATION ANALYSIS OF BALL BEARINGS Finding Problems with Bearings and rotating equipment using Vibration Analysis 3.2 3.3 3.4 4. 5. Four Stages in failure are detected with Vibration Analysis MRC Ball Bearing Vibration Data Vibration Based Diagnostics CONCLUSION REFERENCES

1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 What is a Ceramic Hybrid Ball Bearing?
A Ceramic Hybrid Ball Bearing is a precision bearing in which one or all of its components are made of ceramic elements from silicon nitride. Silicon nitride is a highly processed silica and ceramic material, similar to the heat absorbing, highly resilient tiles on the Space Shuttle. These tiles are used to line the heat shield of the Space Shuttle, as they protect it from the 2500 plus degrees F. extremes of reentry into the earth's atmosphere. The use of Ceramics for bearing components results in a far superior product over traditional all steel ball bearings.

There are basically three types of Ceramic Ball Bearings:

1. Ceramic "Hybrid" Ball Bearings: Where the rolling elements, or balls, are ceramic, but the inner and outer rings are still conventional steels. 2. "Partial" Ceramic Ball Bearings: Where the rolling elements, and the inner ring are ceramic, but the outer ring is still made of steel. 3. "Full" Ceramic Ball Bearings: Where the rolling elements, inner, and outer rings are made of silicon nitride

1.2

FEATURES

60% lighter than steel balls

Up to 55% higher running speeds. Centrifugal forces reduced with 60% less rotating mass. Less rotating mass means faster acceleration and deceleration. Lower vibration levels results in finer surface finishes. Higher speedability with grease or oil lubrication. Lower starting torque loads. Reduced ball skid results in a "truer" running bearing. Less heat build up results in less friction and longer lubricant life. Dissipates heat quickly. 35% less thermal expansion 50% less thermal conductivity. Fatigue life increased. Corrosion resistant in harsh chemical atmospheres. Performs up to 15 times longer in poor lubrication environments as compared to steel. Low adhesive wear Improved lubricant life Superior corrosion resistance

Non-conductive
Ceramic is a natural insulator, and is beneficial where electric motor design requires a high degree of electrical insulating properties between the armature and field windings. The service life of conventional steel ball bearings in electric motors is sometimes reduced, due to pitting and corrosion caused by trace discharging, between the rings and balls. Ceramic hybrids do not suffer from this, due to their natural insulating properties. Due to their inherent longer service life, it results in a more reliable and longer lasting product.

Less maintenance
Due to a minimum level of Adhesive Wear, bearing components and lubricants last much longer, saving you expensive service and repair time.

High Hot Strength

High compressive and flexural strength over a wide temperature range. Lends itself for use to 2200 degrees F.

Low Density
Specific density of 3.2 compared to 7.8 for steel. At high bearing operating speeds, the bearing balls have a centrifugal force which may exceed the external loads on the bearing. The low density of ceramics can reduce this load considerably.

High Hardness
While bearing steel is in the RC 58-64 hardness range, silicon nitride has a hardness of RC 75-80 and offers excellent wear resistance.

1.3

TECHNICAL CHARTS

1.3

LIMITATIONS

In some applications, we can see that the properties of the hybrid ceramic

bearing would lead to an increased life compared to an all-steel bearing. However, this is not true of all cases. In normal-speed applications where true fatigue spalling of a raceway tends to be the failure mode, the hybrid ceramic design would not be expected to increase bearing life rather, a significant decrease in the life would be expected. (The higher stiffness of the ceramic balls reduces the size of the ball/raceway contact patch under load, thus raising the contact stress compared to the all-steel design.) Therefore, potential applications for hybrid bearings need to be carefully weighed on a case-by-case basis.

The service life of ceramic hybrid bearings is at least twice that of conventional ball bearings and could be as much as five times the service life of conventional bearings, depending on operating conditions.

2. HYBRID CYRAMIC BALL BEARINGS

The term hybrid ceramic ball bearing normally refers to a bearing assembly consisting of inner and outer rings of standard bearing steel, with silicon nitride (Si3N4) ceramic balls. For some applications, the properties of the bearing with ceramic balls offer functional improvements in several different areas over a conventional all-steel bearing. There is a very significant cost penalty for the hybrid ceramic design that largely limits its present-day use to certain high-end applications. However, this cost gap is expected to shrink over time with advances in ceramic ball manufacturing technology.

2.1

Bearings for Machine Tools Spindles

One of the predominant present-day applications for hybrid bearings is

angular contact sets for high speed machine tool spindles. This application utilizes some of the key properties of the ceramic balls compared to steel: Lower Mass: The mass of a ceramic ball is about 40% of that of a steel ball of the same size. This means the hybrid ceramic bearing operates with less friction, less ball skidding, lower moment from gyro-spin, and therefore, lower operating temperature for a given speed, and higher limiting speed for a given size by a margin of 20% or more.

As running speed increases, ceramic balls run cooler than conventional steel balls. The reduced heat build-up prolongs lubricant life.

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Higher Stiffness: A hybrid ceramic design typically increases bearing stiffness by 15 to 20% compared to all-steel. This allows increased cutting accuracy, as the spindle deflects less under load. Overall vibration is also reduced.

2.2

Beyond Spindle Bearings

There are other properties of hybrid ceramics that hold potential benefits

for a variety of bearing applications: Smooth surface finish / high hardness: Bearing-grade ceramic balls are harder than bearing steel and have very good surface finish. Wear between the surfaces is reduced, and there is no cold welding between the ceramic ball and steel raceways under poor lube conditions. Therefore, the hybrid design generally requires less lubricant and is more forgiving of marginal lubrication than the allsteel design. The high hardness of the ceramic balls also makes them more resistant to surface-initiated damage from contaminant particles. Corrosion resistance: The chemically inert ceramic balls will not corrode a potentially important issue for bearing applications such as food machinery and medical tools. (Special anti-corrosion treatments of the steel inner and outer rings may be needed in these cases.) Electrical resistance: Ceramic balls are nonconductive, and therefore would prevent electrical pitting damage to bearings in electric motors or related equipment.

2.3

Identification Marking Methods

Hybrid ceramic bearings are identified according to each manufacturers

system of numbers and/or letters detailing size, style, etc. Ceramics are often further identified with a prefix or suffix.

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3. VIBRATION ANALYSIS OF BALL BEARINGS 3.1 Finding Problems with Bearings and rotating equipment using Vibration Analysis
Bearings with rolling elements generate several frequencies which can be calculated and detected if you know the physical dimensions of the bearings and the R. P. M. at which they are running. These frequencies can be recorded with an accelerometer and a spectrum analyzer. Many companies sell equipment and software for trending of these data. When there is a difference from bearing fault frequencies, a person experienced in reading these printed charts and trends can predict when a bearing may fail.

3.2

Four Stages in failure are detected with Vibration Analysis

I. The first stage (normal operation) appears at ultrasonic frequencies from about 1,200K to 3,600K CPM (cycles per minute). At this point the frequencies are evaluated by Spike Energy and Shock pulse instruments which listen to these frequencies. Trending this information can tell a person if there is a change or not. II. The second stage of bearing failure defects begin to ring bearing components natural frequencies, which are picked up with a spectrum analyzer in the middle of the spectrum, 3OK-12OK CPM. III. In the third stage of failure, bearing defect frequencies and harmonics appear on the spectrum as bearing defect frequencies. At this time if you remove the bearing, you can see the defects in the rolling elements. IV. Stage four appears toward the end of bearing life. It shows up as random high frequency vibration spikes on the spectrum, all running together. With vibration analysis, many other problems with rotating equipment can be diagnosed without taking equipment out of service. This can save hours of downtime and thousands of dollars. 12

3.3

MRC Ball Bearing Vibration Data

Frequency as related to vibration is the number of times an impact

occurs during a specific period. Frequency is measured in Hertz (cycles per second) and CPM (Cycles Per Minute). 1 Hz = 60 CPM Predominant Frequencies generated by bearings are: BPFO Bearing Outer Race Frequency BPFI Bearing Inner Race Frequency BSF Ball Spin Frequency Rolling Elements FTF Fundamental Train Frequency These frequencies and multiples of these frequencies show up as spikes on a vibration analysis spectrum when bearings begin to fail.

3.4

Vibration Based Diagnostics

Rolling element bearing fault frequencies are generated when a bearing

begins to fatigue. This happens due to impulses generated when a bearing element passes the fatigue defects. The impulses occur at periodic frequencies when the bearing rotates and are often referred to as fundamental defect frequencies. These defect frequencies are related to bearing geometry and shaft speed. The following bearing defect frequencies in hertz were calculated for the test bearing: all pass frequency (FTF).

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Where Nb Number of balls or rollers Bd Ball or Roller diameter Pd Bearing Pitch Diameter Contact angle

Table 4 lists bearing defect frequencies for the test bearings at 2 speeds, 10 000 and 15 000 rpm. Several vibration based techniques exist for extracting bearing defect frequencies from vibration data. Howard provides an excellent overview of vibration based diagnostic tools used to indicate bearing failures. Time domain, frequency domain, and envelope analysis techniques will be collected, monitored and processed in real-time using the data acquisition program. BEARING DEFECT FREQUENCY COEFFICIENTS Hertz Ball pass frequency inner race (BPFI) Ball pass frequency outer race (BPFO) Ball spin frequency (BSF) Fundamental train frequency (FTF) 10000 rpm 12688 899 459 69 15000 rpm 1902 1348 688 104

In the time domain, the vibration data waveform is analyzed for impacts that correspond to the rotation of the rolling elements past the damage for each shaft revolution. Time domain statistical parameters such as RMS, peak, crest factor, and kurtosis are calculated for a sample of time domain data. As the damage occurs, an increase in these values should occur. The bearing time domain metrics 14

are calculated based on the following equations where x equals the mean value of the time signal x (t) having N data points:

Statistical parameters can be calculated for the entire frequency range and for user selected frequency bands. In the frequency domain, an FFT is used to estimate the power spectrum of the discrete time signal. From the spectrum, characteristic bearing defect frequencies identified, and the change in amplitude at these frequencies is used for trending. Related to this is a cepstrum analysis of the vibration data. The purpose of this technique is to find repetitive impulse components in the raw vibration signal. The frequency spectrum is analyzed for frequencies that correspond to bearing defect frequency harmonics and sidebands. Cepstrum for this analysis is calculated by determining the natural logarithm of magnitude of the Fourier transform of x, then obtaining the inverse Fourier transform of the resulting sequence: C (t) =F-1 {log F(x(1)}, where F(x (t)) is the original frequency spectrum Envelope analysis is another technique used during testing to indicate bearing health. Each time a defect in a rolling element makes contact with another 15

bearing surface, an impulse is generated. The bearing structural resonances are excited by these periodic impacts at bearing defect frequencies. Enveloping isolates these small repetitive impulses and enhances the response of these small repetitive signals from the machines large low frequency synchronous vibration signals.

CONCLUSION :
The hybrid bearings has been developed to evaluate the performance health monitoring tools during the failure progression of conventional and hybrid bearings. Experiments performed in this test facility will provide valuable data on the failure progression of state-of-the-art ceramic hybrid bearings and the diagnostic tools required to predict this failures. Results from this tests will enable implementation of Hybrid Bearings in future aerospace applications.

REFERENCES:
1. Nikiski, S. (2000), Ceramic Bearing for Special Environments, NSK Journal of Motion & Control, 2. Crawford, A.R. and Crawford, S. (1992), The Simplified Handbook of Vibration Analysis, Computational Systems, Incorporated. 3. Paula J. Dempsey, Hybrid Bearing Prognostic Test Rig, Glenn Research Centre, Cleveland, Ohio.

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