Are you inspecting bearing defects to identify root cause?

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rms fan NDE bearing defects root cause spalling

How can Vibration Analysis help detect a bearing defect?

30-Second Summary

  • Vibration analysis can help uncover a bearing defect, but can’t do much to enhance plant reliability.
  • Detecting the root cause of the bearing defect is equally important when it comes to ensuring that the same problem doesn’t occur in the future.
  • RMS offers Online, Public, and Onsite ISO 18436-2 CAT I to CAT IV courses for vibration analysis.

Bearing Defect

Identifying a bearing defect using vibration analysis is not going to improve plant reliability. To do this we have to look at the root cause of the defect and take action to prevent the same problem re-occurring in the future. 

Here is a nice example from a large ID Fan, after a 3 month shut down of the plant. The fan was restarted, straight away an outer race defect was picked up on the Fan NDE bearing by an RMS engineer.

 

rms fan NDE bearing defect blog

Understanding the basics of Vibration Analysis is a must-have when identifying and resolving bearing defects. Upskill, join the next VCAT course!

rms fan NDE bearing defect data before shutdown blog
The damaged bearing was planned in for replacement. At RMS we are always trying to find the root cause so the bearing was cleaned and inspected. You can clearly see the bearing has suffered from corrosion whilst the fan was stationary. Spalling has started to occur in one area.

rms fan NDE bearing defect root cause spalling

In this bearing defect case the root cause of the problem was that the fan was not rotated during its 3 month shutdown. This allowed corrosion to take place within the bearing leading to a defect upon start-up. Plans are now in place for future shutdowns to rotate the shafts to eliminate this type of defect.

Real-World Bearing Defect Diagnosis using Vibration Analysis

In this video, Stuart Walker provides a comprehensive, hands-on tutorial on how to diagnose a bearing defect through data collection, analysis, and inspection, identifying the root cause of the damaged bearing.

Q. Can Motion Amplification be used to help identify bearing faults? A. You won’t typically be looking or see bearing defect frequencies – you will often see the root cause though, in many cases even more valuable.

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FAQs

It is important, but alone it’s not going to improve plant reliability. To do this we have to look at the root cause of the defect and take action to prevent the same problem re-occurring in the future.

In this case, that was the root cause. Without rotation it allowed corrosion to take place within the bearing leading to a defect upon start-up. Plans are now in place for future shutdowns to rotate the shafts to eliminate this type of defect.

We do indeed! Students can choose from ISO 18436-2 CAT I to CAT IV. Courses are certified by BINDT or Mobius Institue. Study options include: Online, Public and Onsite. See the Vibration Analysis Courses page for more details.

Last updated: 13th February 2025

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