A PCA - Two Stage Bayesian Sensor Fusion Approach for Diagnosing Electrical and Mechanical Faults in Induction Motors

Induction motors are widely used in industrial plants for critical operations. Stator faults, bearing faults or rotor faults can lead to unplanned downtime with associated cost and safety implications. Different sensors may be used to monitor the health state of induction motors with each sensor typically being better suited to diagnosing different faults. Condition monitoring approaches which fuse data from multiple sensors have the potential to diagnose a greater number of faults. A sensor fusion approach based on the combination of a two-stage Bayesian method and Principal Component Analysis is proposed for diagnosing both electrical and mechanical faults in induction motors. Acoustic, electric and vibration signals are gathered from motors operating under different loading conditions and health states. The inclusion of the PCA step ensures robustness to varying loading conditions. The obtained results highlight that the proposed method performs better than equivalent single stage or feature-based Bayesian methods.