Combining Wavelets and AR Identification for Condition Monitoring of Electric-cam Mechanisms Using PLCopen Readings of Motor Torque

This paper addresses the problem of monitoring the state of health of electric motor driven mechanisms. The proposed condition monitoring procedure belongs to the data-driven methods and employs a combination of wavelet analysis and autoregressive model identification. It exploits the fact that the torque motor signal is a readily available measurement in industrial computers complying with the PLCOpen standard and how motion controllers execute electric cams. In particular, the torque provided by the PLC is represented as the sum between the ideal torque and an additional contribution that contains information about mechanism health condition. The procedure completely removes the ideal torque and analyzes the residual component to highlight and classify possible fault conditions. The described condition monitoring procedure is tested on real data in a laboratory setup.