Tribology International 33 (2000) 3945 www.elsevier.

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Application of acoustic emission technique for the detection of defects in rolling element bearings
A. Choudhury 1, N. Tandon
*

ITMME Centre, Indian Institute of Technology, Hauz Khas, New Delhi 110016, India Received 29 July 1998; received in revised form 4 January 2000; accepted 26 January 2000

Abstract The usefulness of acoustic emission (AE) measurements for the detection of defects in roller bearings has been investigated in the present study. Defects were simulated in the roller and inner race of the bearings by the spark erosion method. AE of bearings without defect and with defects of different sizes has been measured. For small defect sizes, ringdown counts of AE signal has been found to be a very good parameter for the detection of defects both in the inner race and roller of the bearings tested. However, the counts stopped increasing after a certain defect size. Distributions of events by ringdown counts and peak amplitudes are also found to be good indicators of bearing defect detection. With a defect on a bearing element, the distributions of events tend to be over a wider range of peak amplitudes and counts. 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Acoustic emission; Rolling element bearings; Defect detection; Condition monitoring

1. Introduction Acoustic emission (AE) is the phenomenon of transient elastic wave generation in materials under stress. When the material is subjected to stress at a certain level, a rapid release of strain energy takes place in the form of elastic waves which can be detected by transducers placed on it. Plastic deformation and growth of cracks are among the main sources of acoustic emission in metals. AE technique is, therefore, widely used in nondestructive testing for the detection of crack propagation and failure detection in rotating machinery. The signal is generated and measured in the frequency range which is greater than 100 kHz. AE monitoring has an added advantage that it can even detect the growth of subsurface cracks whereas vibration monitoring can normally detect a defect when it appears on the surface. The most commonly measured AE parameters are ringdown counts, events and peak amplitude of the signal. Ringdown counts involve counting the number of
* Corresponding author. Tel.: +91-11-685-7658; fax: +91-11-6857658. E-mail address: ntandon@itmmec.iitd.ernet.in (N. Tandon). 1 Present address: Mechanical Engineering Department, Regional Engineering College, Silchar-788010, India.

times the amplitude exceeds a preset voltage (threshold level) in a given time and gives a simple number characteristic of the signal. An event consists of a group of ringdown counts and signies a transient wave. Several studies have been conducted to investigate the AE response of defective bearings. Rogers [1] suggested the application of acoustic emission as a measure of the condition of the slow speed antifriction bearing of offshore gas production platform slewing cranes. Yoshioka and Fujiwara [2,3] have shown that AE parameters can detect defects before they appear in the vibration acceleration range and can also detect the possible sources of AE generation during a fatigue life test of thrust loaded ball bearings. The source locator system was later improved by introducing two AE sensors into the system and measuring the difference of arrival times of acoustic emission signals at the sensors [4,5]. Some researchers have studied the AE parameters with simulated local defects on various bearing elements. Acoustic emission signals have been shown to detect defects in the form of a ne scratch on the inner race of an axially loaded angular contact ball bearing but at low speeds only [6,7]. Tandon and Nakra [8] demonstrated the usefulness of some acoustic emission parameters, such as peak amplitude and count, for detection of defects in radially loaded ball bearings at low and normal speeds. Tan [9] sug-

0301-679X/00/$ - see front matter 2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. PII: S 0 3 0 1 - 6 7 9 X ( 0 0 ) 0 0 0 1 2 - 8

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gested that measurement of the area under the amplitude time curve is a preferred method for detection of defects in rolling element bearings. Distribution of events by counts and peak amplitude has also been used for quality inspection of bearings [10]. The aim of the present study is to investigate the changes in AE signal for different sizes of simulated defects on the inner race and a roller of radially loaded cylindrical roller bearings. Acoustic emission generated in bearings which are new and undamaged is expected to be at a low level. In the case of damaged bearings, when the rollers roll across the defects in races, or a defect in the rolling element strikes the races, the stress concentration in the bearing elements along the defect boundary is expected to cause a drastic increase in the emission rate. The parameters measured in the present investigation are ringdown counts and statistical distribution of events by ringdown counts and peak amplitude. Preliminary AE measurements have indicated that the increase in ringdown counts is much greater than in other parameters, such as event and peak amplitude, when bearings, with and without a defect, are tested. Therefore, a detailed investigation on ringdown counts has been carried out under different loads and speeds. However, the statistical distributions of events versus ringdown counts and peak amplitude are supposed to reect the inter-relationship among these parameters for various sizes of defect. It appears from the literature that such a study on radially loaded roller bearings has not as yet been undertaken. Typical results of this study are presented in this paper.

induced vibration to the test rig is reduced. Rubber sheets have also been provided under the motor for the purpose of vibration isolation. The speed of the rig is measured by a non-contact tachometer after xing a light reective tape on the shaft. For applying radial load on the test bearings, a loading arrangement as shown in Fig. 1(b) has been used. The lever used in the arrangement is of square cross-section and is made of aluminium. It is pinned at one end and provides a lever ratio of 5. A bolt connects the lever with the test bearing housing and restricts any relative movement between them. The transducer (9) can be mounted on the top of the test bearing housing so that the measurements can be performed in the zone of maximum load. 2.2. Test bearings The test bearings used in the present study are cylindrical roller bearings of NJ series with normal clearance. Five sizes of SKF bearings, NJ 202, 204, 205, 206 and 207, having bore diameters of 15, 20, 25, 30 and 35 mm, respectively, were used. All these bearings have polyamide cages. Bearings of NJ series were chosen because the inner races of these bearings can be easily separated and thus the creation of simulated defects on the inner races and the rollers becomes easier. Two bearings of each size were used in the present investigation. At rst, all the bearings were tested without any defect on them. Subsequently, for each size, one simulated defect was introduced across the length of a roller of one bearing and the inner raceway of the other bearing by the spark erosion technique. Sketches of the inner raceway and the roller with defects are shown in Fig. 2. For NJ 206 bearings, the widths of the defects were increased gradually from 0.15 mm to 2.0 mm on the same bearing. Other bearings were tested with only one defect size of 1 mm width. For all these defect sizes, the depth was kept constant at 0.25 mm. The width of the defect sizes for all the bearings are listed in Table 1. The defect sizes have been measured after their creation and have been found to be within 5% of the values stated. Before testing a bearing for any defect size, it was immersed in clean, boiling 1,1,1-trichloroethane for a few minutes to remove the preserving lubricant on it. An amount of grease to ll 40% of the internal volume was applied to each bearing immediately after cleaning. 2.3. Instrumentation Measurements have been carried out using the microprocessor-based measurement system by Acoustic Emission Technology Corp. (AET), USA. The transducer used (AET AC 175L) has a resonant frequency of 175 kHz. It has been mounted on the test bearing hous-

2. Experimental set-up 2.1. Test rig A sketch of the test rig on which the experiments were conducted is shown in Fig. 1. It consists of a shaft (3) supported on two bearings (4). The support bearings are 55 mm bore deep groove ball bearings of SKF make and designation 6311. These bearings are located by means of lock nuts and washers. Plummer block housings (5) were used for the support bearings and they are mounted on rigid supports. Locating rings (6) were provided inside the housing to restrict the movement of the shaft. The shaft is extended beyond the right support bearing such that the test bearings (7) may be easily mounted on or dismounted from it. The extended portion of the shaft is stepped and of varying diameter to allow testing of different sizes of bearings ranging from 15 mm to 35 mm bore in steps of 5 mm. The test bearings are mounted in split-type housings (8). The drive to the test rig is provided by a d.c. motor (1) through a belt drive (2). Since the motor is mounted on a separate structure, the transmission of motor-

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Fig. 1.

(a) The test rig. (b) The loading arrangement.

Table 1 Size and location of defects in bearings Bearing size Width of defect on Inner race (mm) NJ NJ NJ NJ Fig. 2. Sketch of (a) an inner race and (b) a roller with a simulated defect. 202 204 205 206 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.5, 0.0, 1.0 1.0 1.0 0.15, 0.25, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0 1.0 Roller (mm) 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.0, 0.5, 0.0, 1.0 1.0 1.0 0.15, 0.25, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0 1.0

NJ 207

ings with the help of cloth adhesive tapes and lithiumbased grease has been used as couplant. The preamplier, AET 160B, has a gain of 60 dB. It also accommodates a lter (AET FL 12X) with a passband of 125 kHz to 2 MHz. The output of the preamplier is fed to the central processor of the measurement system AET 5000

which is connected to a microcomputer. The central processor can offer a further gain of 0 to 40 dB, expressed as 0 to 100 times the preamplier output. The frequency response curve of the transducer shows two major peaks, the smaller one at 110 kHz and the bigger one at 175 kHz. The preamplier incorporates a lter with lower

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cut-off frequency of 125 kHz so that the effect of the 110 kHz peak is eliminated. Threshold level of 1 V (automatic) has been selected for all the measurements. An automatic threshold level changes itself according to the background noise and thus eliminates its effect. Gain settings for different measurements are discussed in the next section. Ringdown counts in 10 s have been displayed for a total duration of 60 s on the measurement system. The average value of counts in 10 s is used in the results presented. The results for the statistical distributions of events versus counts and peak amplitudes have been obtained for an emission duration of 2 min. Peak amplitude of the signal is expressed in dB with 0 dB corresponding to 1 mV at the preamplier output.
Fig. 3. Acoustic emission ringdown counts of NJ 206 bearings at 75 kg load and 1500 rpm speed. *, roller defect; , inner race defect.

3. Results and discussion Acoustic emission response of NJ 206 bearings with no defect and with various defect sizes on them, has been measured at different radial loads and speeds. Radial loads ranging from 25 kg to 125 kg in steps of 25 kg and speeds from 100 to 1500 rpm have been used for measurements. The load has been varied at 1500 rpm and the speed at 75 kg load. The responses for other test bearings have been measured at a radial load of 75 kg and a speed of 1500 rpm. The statistical distributions have also been obtained for a load of 75 kg and a speed of 1500 rpm. It was intended to choose the gain settings at the central processor such that a low level of emission is recorded for the undamaged bearings. For a speed of 1500 rpm, this condition is satised for a gain setting of 4 even if the load is varied. However, for different speeds, a wide variation in emission rate is observed. A gain setting of 25 has been selected for measurements under varying speed condition. For some defective bearings, it is not possible to obtain results at the same gain setting for different speeds. This is because of an upper limit in the event rate that can be processed on the system. Therefore, for these cases, gain versus ringdown counts have been plotted and the curves are extrapolated to obtain the values of ringdown counts at the desired gain. The results reported in this paper are for a gain of 4 for constant speed and 25 for varying speed condition. Some measurements in this study have been repeated after a few days interval. They have indicated some variation from the original values. However, this variation is not of much consequence as there is a very large difference between the values of bearings with and without defect. The ringdown counts for different defect sizes in NJ 206 bearings are given in Fig. 3. Since the ringdown counts for undamaged bearings are very low (less than 100), these have been marked at 0 (zero) in the linear plot shown in the gure. Subsequent plots give the results for good bearings. For both inner race and roller defects, a very sharp rise in the ringdown counts has been observed, even for the smallest defect size of 0.15 mm. This is in contrast to the results reported by Tan [9] for ball bearings. He has reported failure of AE counts to effectively detect defects up to 0.5 mm size in the outer races of 6304 ball bearings. Tandon and Nakra [8] have reported success in detecting 0.15 mm inner race defect and defect sizes greater than 0.2 mm on the outer races of 6002 ball bearings through measurements of AE counts. Their study, however, has failed to detect a ball defect by this method. Fig. 3 also shows that ringdown counts increase rapidly up to 0.5 mm size in the case of inner race defects. Beyond this defect size, they tend to stabilise. In case of roller defects, the rise in counts is quite sharp up to 1 mm defect size. However, no signicant information can be obtained with further increase in the defect size. One possible reason could be that all the signal components have crossed the threshold level and so there is no further increase in counts. The results for variation in AE counts of bearings, having different bore, with no defect and with 1 mm defect, are given in Fig. 4. R and I represent the results for bearings with a roller defect and an inner race defect, respectively, and ND in parentheses indicates the results for these bearings in good condition. This notation has also been used in subsequent plots. R(ND) and I(ND) are two different bearings, both without defect. Later on, in one of them a roller defect was created and in the other one, an inner race defect. Fig. 4 shows that the AE counts of all the bearings in undamaged condition lie in the same range and are less than 100. For defective bearings also, the values lie in the same zone. The AE counts generated do not appear to depend on the bearing bore. However, there is a wide variation in AE counts for bearings with and without defect. The results of ringdown counts for NJ 206 bearings,

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Fig. 4. Acoustic emission ringdown counts of bearings with no defect and with 1-mm-wide defect at 75 kg load and 1500 rpm speed.

Fig. 5. Acoustic emission ringdown counts of NJ 206 bearings with no defect and with 1-mm-wide defect at 1500 rpm speed.

with no defect and with a 1-mm-wide defect for different loads and speeds, are given in Figs. 5 and 6, respectively. The load plots of Fig. 5 show that there is not much variation in AE counts for change in load for both good and defective roller bearings. This is true irrespective of the defect location (inner race or roller). Tandon and

Nakra [8], however, found the AE counts for good ball bearings to increase rapidly with an increase in load. The speed plots of Fig. 6 show that there is a substantial increase in AE counts with increase in speed. This increase is observed in the case of both undamaged and damaged bearings. From separate studies, similar ndings have been reported by other researchers [8,9]. Change in speed, even under the same loading condition, causes signicant change in dynamic stresses. This change in stress values is probably responsible for the change in AE counts with speed. In the present study, emission has not been detected for some cases of good bearings running at low speeds of 100 and 250 rpm. However, for the defective bearings, AE counts of the order of 103 have been obtained at the lowest speed of 100 rpm. Distribution of events by peak amplitudes and ringdown counts for NJ 206 bearings are given in Figs. 7 and 8. Distribution of events by peak amplitudes are given in Fig. 7(a) to (c). Fig. 7(a) shows that for good bearings low event emission occurs over a narrow range of peak amplitude (55 to 65 dB). With a defect on a bearing, not only a rise in event emission rate is observed but the events are emitted over a wider range of peak amplitude. For the smallest defect size of 0.15 mm also, the emission takes place over a wider range of 40/50 to 80 dB, as shown in Fig. 7(b). Maximum emission of events, however, takes place with lower values of peak amplitudes. As the defect progresses there is not much change in the range of peak amplitude over which the events are emitted. However, Fig. 7(c) shows that for a larger defect size more events are emitted with higher values of peak amplitude. Maximum events have been emitted over the range of 75 to 80 dB. Distribution of events by ringdown counts are shown in Fig. 8(a) to (c). For undamaged bearings, event emission takes place over the lower range of ringdown counts, as shown in Fig. 8(a). Maximum events are emitted over the count range of 0 to 10. With a defect on a bearing element, there is a tendency for the events to be emitted with higher ringdown counts. With the smallest defect size of 0.15 mm on the inner race and a roller of NJ 206, Fig. 8(b) shows that events are emitted over a count range of 0 to 90 and 0 to 140, respectively, though most of the events are emitted over the smallest count range of 0 to 10. This trend continues as the defect progresses. However, with larger defect sizes, the emission of events with higher ringdown counts increases. It is shown in Fig. 8(c) that for a 1 mm defect on the inner race and a roller of NJ 206, the maximum emission occurs over count ranges of 120 to 150 and 190 to 210, respectively.

Fig. 6. Acoustic emission ringdown counts of NJ 206 bearings with no defect and with 1-mm-wide defect at 75 kg load.

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Fig. 7. Distribution of events by peak amplitude for NJ 206 bearings (a) with no defect, (b) with 0.15 mm defect and (c) with 1-mm-wide defect at 75 kg load and 1500 rpm speed.

Fig. 8. Distribution of events by ringdown counts for NJ 206 bearings (a) with no defect, (b) with 0.15 mm defect and (c) with 1-mm-wide defect at 75 kg load and 1500 rpm speed.

4. Conclusion The usefulness of the acoustic emission method for defect detection in rolling element bearings has been investigated. The method of ringdown counts has been found to be a very good parameter for the detection of defects in both the inner race and roller of the bearings tested. The sharp rise in the value of counts for the

smallest defect size tested indicates that this may serve as a good parameter for incipient fault detection in bearings. For larger defect sizes, however, AE counts are unable to provide any information about the progress of the defect. Distributions of events by ringdown counts and peak amplitudes are also found to be good indicators of bearing defect detection. With a defect on a bearing element, the distributions of events tend to be over a wider range

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of peak amplitudes and counts. From a study on quality inspection of bearings, a similar distinction in distributions has been observed for new and regenerated bearings. The present study also shows that as the defect size increases, more events are emitted with higher values of peak amplitudes and ringdown counts.

[4]

[5]

[6] [7]

References
[8] [1] Rogers LM. The application of vibration signature analysis and acoustic emission source location to on-line condition monitoring of anti-friction bearings. Tribol Int 1979;12(2):519. [2] Yoshioka T, Fujiwara T. A new acoustic emission source locating system for the study of rolling contact fatigue. Wear 1982;81:1836. [3] Yoshioka T, Fujiwara T. Application of acoustic emission technique to detection of rolling bearing failure. In: Dorneld DA,

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editor. Acoustic emission monitoring and analysis in manufacturing. New York: ASME, 1984:5575. Yoshioka T. Detection of rolling contact subsurface fatigue cracks using acoustic emission technique. Lubr Eng 1992;49(4):3038. Yoshioka T, Takeda M. Clarication of rolling contact fatigue initiation using acoustic emission technique. Lubr Eng 1994;51(1):414. Smith JD. Vibration monitoring of bearings at low speeds. Tribol Int 1982;June:13944. McFadden PD, Smith JD. Acoustic emission transducer for the vibration monitoring of bearings at low speeds. Proc IMechE 1984;198(C8):12730. Tandon N, Nakra BC. Defect detection in rolling element bearings by acoustic emission method. J Acoustic Emission 1990;9(1):258. Tan CC. Application of acoustic emission to the detection of bearing failures. In: Proceedings, Tribology Conference. Brisbane, Australia: Institution of Engineers, 1990:1104. Bansal V, Gupta BC, Prakash A, Eshwar VA. Quality inspection of rolling element bearing using acoustic emission technique. J Acoustic Emission 1990;9(2):1426.