Impacts of Reduced Motor Cooling on Reliability

Gerstenkorn, Ralph; Somes, Tyler

doi:10.1109/tia.2016.2613977

Cited by 9 publications

(6 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…Optimal grease service life for any given bearing size can be achieved in a narrow temperature region. Grease temperature inside bearing housing can be 11°C higher than operating bearing temperature (Gerstenkorn and Somes, 2016; NSK Americas, 2015; SKF, 1998). Figure 3 represents operating grease service life in a 40–55°C operating range.…”

Section: Operating Temperature and Grease Service Lifementioning

confidence: 99%

“…The re-lubrication strategy should follow the operating ranges of bearing. A recommendation is made, where bearing lubrication interval changes with operating temperature exponentially (Gerstenkorn and Somes, 2016; SKF, 2011; Tech Talk Publication, 2009). One of the failure analyses of bearing in a wind turbine has been presented by Sankar et al (2012).…”

Section: Operating Temperature and Grease Service Lifementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Re-lubrication is an important process that keeps bearing functional under safe operation limits. Bearing lubrication interval multiplier and its dependence on temperature for a particular bearing type has been demonstrated (Gerstenkorn and Somes, 2016; SKF, 2011; Tech Talk Publication, 2009). What happens if the non-drive end and drive- end bearing operates under different temperature conditions?…”

Section: Grease Lubrication Interval Multiplier and Its Bearing Temperature Dependencementioning

confidence: 99%

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Methods to improve wind turbine generator bearing temperature imbalance for onshore wind turbines

Singh

Sundaram

2021

Wind Engineering

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For better annual energy production, wind turbine generator components are expected to perform efficiently and safely. Development of recent high-efficiency generators and motors leading their designs with less cooling capacity. Bearings are one of the most stressed components in the generator. Recent studies have indicated that bearing failure is the prime cause of generator failure, in wind turbine application. Grease lubrication deterioration was found to be the leading cause of motors and generators bearing failure. Grease service life for generators are closely associated with the operating temperature. One issue with the less cooling design is the higher bearing temperature. This led to marginal lubrication, premature bearing failure, and reduce generator reliability. To verify this and address the issue of inadequate and imbalanced bearing cooling; this paper presents recent experimentation performed on-air to air-cooled squirrel cage induction generator. This test addresses a potential issue with the IC6A1A6 cooled generator design and recommends the updates with corresponding standards. To get optimal bearing life and generator reliability, either allowed bearing operating temperature range should be reduced significantly, by developing a new cooling strategy or standards committee should come up with different intervals of lubrication for both ends of the bearings. Issues similar to with IEEE standard 841 high-efficiency motors can be avoided, where a study performed on the reliability of these motors used in refinery confirmed that motors are at greater risk. A proactive plan based on the result and recommendations in this paper will help to secure the safe wind turbine-generator operation.

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Section: Operating Temperature and Grease Service Lifementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Operating Temperature and Grease Service Lifementioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Grease Lubrication Interval Multiplier and Its Bearing Temperature Dependencementioning

confidence: 99%

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Methods to improve wind turbine generator bearing temperature imbalance for onshore wind turbines

Singh

Sundaram

2021

Wind Engineering

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“…The reliability of the generator is closely associated with its operating temperature. Running the generator at a higher load point leads to compromised bearing cooling (Gerstenkorn and Somes, 2017). With motors operating at rated speed, the magnitude of the electrical discharge machine (EDM) current is big enough to damage both bearings at the drive-end (DE) and non-drive end (NDE) (Magdun et al, 2010), with a bearing temperature of 80 C. For preventing bearing failure Oh and Willwerth (2008) performed a study of the shaft voltage issue and several ways to reduce the bearing current.…”

Section: Generator Bearingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A higher operating temperature leads to more lubrication, in order to avoid bearing failure due to overheating. Figure 7 represents the bearing lubrication interval multiplier with rise in the operating temperature (Gerstenkorn and Somes, 2017). To avoid this there are two possibilities: one is to perform more frequent lubrication (which is the cost-in for LCOE) and the second is to somehow reduce the bearing operating temperature.…”

Section: Generator Bearingmentioning

confidence: 99%

A solution to reduce overheating and increase wind turbine systems availability

Singh

Sundaram

Matuonto³

2020

Wind Engineering

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The ever-increasing demand for electrical power and the tremendous growth of renewable energy sources in the past decade has led designers to design wind turbine system components for optimal performance. Cost optimization, weight reduction, higher performances, and lower non-conformance cost are a few expectations that components are expected to meet in the present market condition. Wind turbine system unavailability impacts the annual energy production of the wind turbine. Overheating of the wind turbine system components is one of the main challenges to overcome. For the heating analysis, we discuss the wind turbine generator as a specific example in this article. This approach is equally valid for other components of wind turbine systems, with heat exchanger. Windings and bearings are the two main components susceptible to failure in the generator for wind turbine applications. The root cause may vary from case to case, but overheating accelerates the generator’s windings and bearing failure and in many cases is the prime reason behind. Running the components at higher load points is one of the reasons for components to overheat. The article presents a solution to improve the performance of the wind turbine system and at the same time making it a commercially attractive choice. This can be achieved by reducing generator windings and bearings operating temperature, and also reducing its cost and weight at the same time. The proposed solution to reduce overheating is achieved and verified through results. The achieved results also explain how one solution is advantageous over the other.

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