Wear characterization by fractal mathematics for quality improvement of machine

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 time-consuming 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.