Rolling element bearings are in most of the rotating equipment that makes up the modern world. The downtime of rotating equipment due to bearing failure can be prevented by using sensor information to predict faults. However, a replicable bearing failure method is necessary for operators to
interpret sensor data and reliably detect faults in industrial equipment. Bearing failure testing is conducted on small scale test rigs and often have a poor explanation of the experimental design. Without a way to replicate the testing and failure causes of bearings, the validity of proposed bearing failure detection methods comes into question. Usually, bearing failure research uses small scale tests rigs, however, this research was conducted using an industrial test rig in order to increase the relevance of the research. This study develops a method for inducing bearing failure on an industrial piece of equipment using lubrication and contamination of the bearing to induce failure in a short amount of time. Contamination and lubrication
failures are the most common bearing failure causes in industry, however, are not commonly used for testing bearing failure in academia. The findings from this research show that failure can be induced through mixed grease contamination within one hour of testing. A test for dirt contamination has been developed, has not been tested yet, because of external circumstances at the research test site.
Author: Aseem Maroo.

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