Citation
(2006), "Awards for Excellence", Journal of Quality in Maintenance Engineering, Vol. 12 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/jqme.2006.15412caa.001
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2006, Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Awards for Excellence
Outstanding paper
The following article was selected for this year’s Outstanding Paper Award for Journal of Quality in Maintenance Engineering
‘‘Wear characterization by fractal mathematics for quality improvement of machine’’
S. GhoshB. SarkarJ. SahaJadavpur University, Kolkata, India
Purpose – The objective of the present work is to find an alternative approach for gearbox condition monitoring using wear particle characterization incorporated with image vision systems.
Design/methodology/approach – It is a quite well-known phenomenon that wear generates whenever two metallic bodies have contact with each; other hence the present work tries to investigate the effect of improper lubrication in the gearbox due to wear particle generation between gear wheels. Since the identification of wear for machine condition monitoring needs much expertise knowledge and is timeconsuming using the conventional process, fractal mathematics with image morphological analysis has been utilized to overcome this situation in the present work.
Findings – The type of wear has been found for the present method by utilizing the lubricant used in the system ferrographically and a great deal of image processing has been done to characterize the type of particle so that the proper maintenance strategy can be undertaken.
Originality/value – Wear particle characterization is a quite common method in maintenance engineering, especially when fault diagnosis of any equipment is concerned. In the present work, the CCD acquisition of the images has been done for different particles, but one analysis amongst them has been shown in this paper. Among all other methodologies, the new technique of fractal mathematics has been used in the present work to minimize the imaging hazards and to make the system more user-friendly.
Keywords: Condition monitoring, Image processing, Mechanical components, Wear
www.emeraldinsight.com/10.1108/13552510510626954
This article originally appeared in Volume 11 Number 4, 2005, pp. 318-32, of Journal of Quality inMaintenance Engineering