Efficient Plant Jan./Feb. 2024 - 24

feature | solution focus
failures or receive false alerts.
Th e AMS monitor empowers users
with fl exibility to tailor measurements
to the machine or application
being monitored. For
example, on a fi ve-bladed fan,
teams can more accurately
monitor the fan by confi guring
a 5x turning speed,
or blade-pass, vibration. In
contrast, on a pump with
eight impeller vanes, they will
be able to confi gure and trend
a diff erent 8x turning speed
vane-pass band. Th e result is
more meaningful alarms and trends
than can be provided by a non-fi t-forpurpose
sensor.
PEAKVUE PLUS
Rotating equipment can experience a variety
of problems, and those problems span a
spectrum of criticality. Nearly all sensors are
designed to identify low-frequency faults
such as imbalance, misalignment, resonance,
and looseness. Th ese are all important
fl aws to catch as, over time, they cause
wear and tear that can lead to the failures
that cause production outages.
However, the most-eff ective sensors on
the market are also designed with patented
technology to detect impacting-a critical
sign of the equipment faults that shut
down machines. Emerson's monitor uses
PeakVue Plus technology to cut through
the complexity of machinery health analysis
and provide a simple, reliable indication
of equipment health using a single trend.
PeakVue Plus not only detects impacting
on critical components such as bearings
and gears, but also tells the technician if
that impacting is a result of common issues,
including lubrication or bearing failure.
Armed with this information, technicians
of any skill level have the decision support
they need to intervene early and remedy
24 | EFFICIENTPLANTMAG.COM
Emerson's AMS Wireless Vibration Monitor uses
nearby sensors as through points to ensure reliable,
continuous data transmission.
Photo courtesy Emerson
removing the device, even in hazardous
environments.
Industrial environments are oſt en
crowded mazes of piping, steel
structures, and process equipment,
making it a challenging environment
for wireless communications,
especially for simple
peer-to-peer wireless networks.
When the normal wireless
connection to the gateway is
interrupted or something blocks
the signal between a sensor and
its gateway, teams end up with
gaps in their data and must spend
frustrating time troubleshooting.
Th e AMS instrument uses a Wiresmall
problems before they become critical
failures.
CONTINUOUS OPERATION
No plant hires personnel with the hope that
they will spend their day changing batteries
on the hundreds or thousands of wireless
sensors scattered around the plant. In many
cases, this is exactly what happens. Many
wireless sensors on the market today were
not designed to have long battery life. When
power is low, it's typically diffi cult or even
impossible to change batteries. Th is can
quickly force a plant to have " battery change
technicians " and experience high total cost
of ownership and a great deal of waste.
Th e AMS wireless unit contains a battery
that operates for 5 yr. under normal operating
conditions. Even when the battery runs
out, it's designed to be replaced in less than
a minute, using normal tools and without
lessHART mesh network, making each
sensor a transmitter and a receiver. If the
normal path to the gateway is unavailable,
the monitor will use neighboring sensors
as a through point to send the data reliably
back to the gateway, resulting in a more
reliable and less-hassle wireless vibration
network.
Plant personnel need tools to remove
the burden of repetitive, low-value tasks
such as manual data collection. Choosing a
generic sensor is typically more expensive
in total cost of ownership and less eff ective
overall than a fi t-for-purpose solution. As
sustainability and effi ciency needs increase,
the AMS Wireless Vibration Monitor will
continue to evolve, helping teams make the
most effi cient use of the personnel resources
they have and ensure they have a fi nger on
the pulse of plant and asset health. EP
Drew Mackley has more than 25 years of
experience in the predictive-maintenance
industry. In that time, Drew has worked with
customers to establish and grow machinery
health-management programs in a variety of
industries and locations around the world.
Mackley has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering
from the Univ. of Tennessee.
JAN/FEB 2024
http://www.EFFICIENTPLANTMAG.COM
Efficient Plant Jan./Feb. 2024

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