Induction machine broken rotor bar diagnostics using prony analysis.

On-line induction machine condition monitoring techniques have been used widely in the detection of motor broken rotor bars for decades. Research has found that when broken bars occur in the machine rotor, the anomaly of electromagnetic field in the air gap will cause two sideband frequency components presenting in the stator current spectrum. Therefore, identification of these sideband frequencies can be used as a convenient and reliable approach to broken rotor bar fault diagnosis. Discrete Fourier Transform (DFT) is a conventional spectral analysis method used in this application. However, the use of DFT has several limitations. The most important one among them is the restriction of frequency resolution by window length. Due to this limitation, the accuracy of broken rotor bar detection can be highly affected in cases such as light machine load and limited data records. However, Prony's method for spectral analysis has the ability of overcoming the restriction of data window length on the frequency resolution, from which the DFT suffers. Such feature makes Prony's method a promising choice for broken rotor bar diagnosis when the machine is operating under light or varying load, or when only restricted data is available. In this thesis, I have demonstrated the implementation of this technique in the induction motor broken rotor bar detection, revealed its better performance than DFT in terms of maintaining high resolution in frequency domain whilst using a much shorter window, and analyzed the influential factors to the method of Prony Analysis (PA). In this thesis, an induction machine model that includes broken rotor bars is developed using Matlab/Simulink and verified by comparing the experimental and the simulated results. The Prony Analysis method for broken bar diagnosis is implemented and tested using both simulated and measured stator current data. Comparisons between PA and DFT results are presented, clearly indicating improvements of broken bar diagnostics using PA.Thesis (M.Eng.Sc.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, 200