6 steps to achieve PdM in coal preparation plant

ALPHA successfully predicted the equipment failure of XuYong coal preparation plant and remove obstacles in advance!

ALPHA, International service provider focusing on intelligent mining industry.

At the end of this October, a predicted maintenance alert has been pushed into maintenance depts. and mobile phone of manager, Mr. Liu. It showed that there might be a failure of bucket elevator’s reducer. On-site workers followed the expert’s advice from ALPHA PdM system, and make pre-failure maintenance of bond axis done avoiding the grave damage of equipment or even more serious unplanned downtime.

The predictive maintenance sensor of ALPHA are running for 24 hours! Receiving and processing massive equipment operation data from various coal preparation plants, real-time comprehensive physical examination of equipment and other assets, without missing any potential risks that may lead to unplanned shutdown of equipment.

ALPHA adopts the IoT sensor technology to monitor the condition of equipment, collect data in real time and monitor the subtle reaction inside the machine, so as to realize the early warning before the equipment failure and avoid the failure through predictive maintenance. Similarly, when tire pressure is insufficient, the driver can get an alarm before driving, and have enough time to take preventive measures in advance to nip the possibility of tire burst in the bud. 

The functions of the ALPHA’s detection system are as follows: on the one hand, in the short period of normal operation of the machine, the detection system protects and monitors the machine all the time, and provides guidance and suggestions for equipment maintenance to ensure the long-term stable operation of the equipment; on the other hand, in the long-term operation, as long as the equipment deteriorates to a certain extent and Near the time of failure, the monitoring of the ALPHA detection system plays a vital role in early warning. 

XuYong coal preparation plant. 

"The monitoring of ALPHA predictive maintenance has made great contributions."

Xuyong Coal Preparation Plant, an industrial test site of ALPHA in southwest China, located in Xuyong County, Luzhou, Sichuan Province. It has been began production since the beginning of 2018. In July, after communicating with the coal preparation plant, our company installed ALPHA's monitoring IOT sensor for the motor of belt conveyor, bucket elevator, vibration screen and other equipment in the coal preparation plant, and monitored the tri-axial vibration and temperature data of the equipment in real time. At the same time, ALPHA's coal preparation equipment maintenance experts from the cloud to focus on the scene through the Chengdu Operating Center remote system, and provide operation and maintenance recommendations.

Sensor site installation - bucket elevator

Pre-monitoring: In the early stage of the monitoring, the vibration and temperature data of each monitoring equipment are in the normal fluctuation range, and the cloud AI system is also constantly learning the operating conditions of field equipment, collecting and processing data. But the abnormal fluctuation of data is coming quietly！ 

Fig: normal operation curve of bucket elevator

The failure warning：From October 20, the X-axis kurtosis of 3004 bucket elevator vibration monitoring data appeared irregular abnormal spike, which means that the vibration of equipment began to fluctuate abnormally. This unusual phenomenon has attracted the attention of experts and began to pay close attention to the operation of this machine. (bucket elevator model: T40-40; speed: 0.27m/s; transportation volume: 30T/h; power: 11KW)

The graph of bucket elevator’s abnormal vibration

Continuous focusing: In order to confirm the condition of the equipment, continue to pay attention to the data of the equipment operation before the normal inspection time. After the next few days of monitoring, and based on the accumulation of historical data, after the analysis of the system, it is predicted that there may be a significant increase in the triaxial vibration kurtosis value within two or three days.

The graph of vibration predicted by the system

Human-computer interaction: Therefore, the system continued to push the warning prompts by the WeChat terminal on October 28, and gave expert opinions to remind the site personnel to pay attention to the proposed maintenance. On October 31, due to the abnormal vibration, the system predicted that the equipment degradation level is too high according to historical data analysis, which may cause a fault. As a result, the system started to push the alarm prompt, and required relevant personnel to carry out maintenance and repair of the equipment in time to avoid equipment damage caused by long-term operation with problem, which may lead to serious accidental shutdown.

Information push of WeChat early warning

Maintenance: On October 31st, under the warning of system, the workshop maintenance worker inspected the bucket elevator when operating, and found that the operation of bucket elevator is weak. So, he stop the operation and removal the motor, reducer and some other parts to looking for problem. It is found that the key sliding of reducer cause damage of roller and gear’s keyway. After repairing of keyway, the bucket elevator returned to operate normally. The greater failure and even the occurrence of production suspending was nipped in the bud, and economic losses was avoided effectively. Field equipment manager appreciated the accurate information warning, and said that they will use the system’s information push and expert advice to better maintain the equipment.

the damage of bond axis

The tips of expert: Some possible reasons for this situation were given by the engineer according to experience, such as the accumulation of slime in the bucket elevator, or the foreign matter falling into the chain and the sprocket, causing the load of the bucket elevator to suddenly increase, thus affect the normal operation of equipment and damage the parts of the reducer. At the same time, it is recommended that more attention could be paid to the problem mentioned, accumulated slime and debris should be cleaned up in time, excessively worn parts should be replaced (such as chains and sprockets).

That a system it is?

“It is just such a little sensor, which look after the health condition of equipment as a nurse ”

”It is just such set of cloud intelligent analysis system, which analysis the physical condition of equipment as a doctor”

Value-added services: The remote equipment operation and maintenance specialist and the coal process site experience exceed 30 years of ALPHA will protected the safe of site carefully.

Question: please explain the predictive maintenance of ALPHA in a passage simply?

Answer: ALPHA is committed to using IoT smart technology to realize continuous operation of equipment, predictive maintenance, avoiding downtime, and reducing unplanned maintenance time. We strive to ensure the long-term operation of the equipment without failure. Once the equipment is about to fail, ALPHA would find it in time and inform the personnel to ensure maintenance beforehand, efficient and fast.

About the ALPHA’s IoT sensor hardware and intelligent predictive maintenance system, please contact us by email or call.