Condition monitoring saves Aleris Aluminium money
March 1st 2008 By installing online condition monitoring systems
on its aluminium rolling mills, Aleris Aluminium is
seeing annual cost savings of around 200,000 euros
Amanufacturer of rolled aluminium
products is saving around 200,000
euros per year by monitoring the
condition of critical machine components
on its rolling mill machinery.
Aleris Aluminium, based in Koblenz,
Germany has installed two FAG DTECT
X1 condition monitoring systems from
FAG Industrial Services (part of The
Schaeffler Group). A total of 16 sensors
and two, 8-channel DTECT X1 systems
monitor the pedestal bearing on the bridle
roller, 14 bearings on the deflector and
flatness monitoring rollers, and 12
bearings and four gears in the mill pinion
gears.
10 sensors are positioned on the bridal
rollers to monitor the two pedestal
bearings on each roller. Another sensor
monitors the condition of the two bearings
on the deflector roller input. A further
sensor is used to monitor the condition of
the two bearings on the flatness
monitoring roller; and two sensors monitor
the mill pinion gears.
On four separate occasions, DTECT X1
detected damage to machine critical
components at the plant. This enabled
Aleris Aluminium to take the appropriate
maintenance measures and prevent any
unplanned machine stoppages. After
installing the DTECT X1 systems, Aleris
Aluminium has calculated the annual cost
savings to be around 200,000 euros,
which comes from three main areas:
faster repair times and material savings on
roller bearings, which amount to some
30,000 euros per year; avoiding chatter
marks was calculated to be worth a
further 120,000 euros per year; and the
elimination of stand fires due to
overheated roller bearings amounts to
around 50,000 euros per year.
In addition to this, F'IS is also providing
remote condition monitoring services to
Aleris Aluminium via two GSM wireless
modems, one on each DTECT X1 unit.
Evaluation of the condition monitoring
data is carried out by F'IS experts at its
Diagnosis Centre in Herzogenrath,
Germany. Any irregularities are
immediately evaluated and reported to the
customer, along with any recommended
remedial action if required. Aleris
Aluminium receives a monthly report from
F'IS on the condition of the monitored
machines and F'IS guarantees a minimum
warning time of four weeks before any
failures. The remote monitoring also
monitors strip speed (conversion to roller
and gear speed) and motor current (load).
The DTECT X1 series is a cost effective
range of online monitoring devices that
enables permanent frequency-selective
monitoring. The advantage of the
DTECTX1 system is that it includes
features that are usually only available in
far more expensive online systems. The
basic model is available as a 2-channel or
8-channel version with external
multiplexer. All commonly used
acceleration, speed and displacement
sensors can be connected to the system.
Depending on the version used, process
quantities such as speed, temperature,
torque and pressure can be recorded.
The signal measured by the sensor is
broken up into its frequency components
using Fast Fourier Transformation (FFT),
which enables monitoring of amplitudes
for previously specified threshold values
within very narrow, defined frequency
bands, including the triggering of an alarm
if these values are exceeded. Therefore,
damage can be detected at an early stage
by means of frequency-selective
monitoring. More articles from Schaeffler (UK) Ltd: | 
