EmpathCMS: Fast, Non-Invasive Fault Detection for Wind Turbines

Allen Hall interviews Dr. Howard Penrose, president and founder of
MotorDoc LLC, about the groundbreaking EmpathCMS electrical
signature analysis system. Dr. Penrose explains how the technology
can quickly and non-invasively detect developing faults in wind
turbine components like generators, gearboxes, and bearings,
helping to optimize maintenance and prevent unplanned downtime.
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Hall: Welcome to the Uptime Wind Energy Podcast. I'm your host,
Allen Hall. Our guest today is Dr. Howard Penrose, the president
and founder of MotorDoc LLC, and the creator of the groundbreaking
EnPath electrical signature analysis system. Dr. Penrose has over
30 years of experience in the field, authoring books, presenting at
conferences worldwide, and providing training and consulting
services to numerous industries, including wind energy. The Empath
system Dr. Penrose developed is a cutting edge tool for condition
monitoring and predictive maintenance of electrical assets like
motors, generators, and transformers. By analyzing the unique
electrical signatures of equipment, Empath can detect developing
faults early, preventing unplanned downtime, optimizing
maintenance, and extending equipment life. Howard, welcome to the
program. Howard Penrose: Thank you very much. And I just have to
correct you on one thing. And that's the Empath system was actually
originally developed at Oak Ridge National Labs and is is,
construct, is basically built and maintained by Framatome ANP,
which is International Nuclear Power Company. We are their non
nuclear distributor and researcher. Large portion of what we do at
MotorDoc is research the applications for electrical signature
analysis and develop the algorithms. Allen Hall: So this is, we
have a magician here today, so to speak, because the whole thing
about wind energy and when you talk to the engineers is the vast
majority of them are mechanical engineers. Drivetrain, blades,
right? They know a lot about how the turbine works mechanically.
But it is an electrical machine. It's there to produce electricity.
And that means there's a lot of electric motors and obviously one
big generator on the turbine. And that's the heart of the system.
And that's the part that we really need to work. What? I think you
guys have done is interesting because you're using the generator to
diagnose things that are happening onside the turbine that are not
only electrical, but mechanical. You want to explain how that works
a little bit? Howard Penrose: Okay. Well, with vibration analysis,
for instance, I will use an accelerometer with a piezoelectric cell
or some of the newer technologies that involve etching and certain
other things of materials. And you put that on the casing of a
machine, and you generate an electrical signal signal in that
component, that accelerometer, for instance, or whatever other type
of device it is for vibration. So you have to read all the movement
of all the components inside the machine through the material.
through that transducer into something else that then translates
that data in, either as a rules based system using squiggly lines
or a machine learning based system, that kind of thing. Electrical
signature analysis is exactly the same thing, except we use the air
gap of the machine, whether it's a generator or a motor or a
transformer, as our transducers, the little magnetic field. In
between the components, not the rotor, not the stator. And we
gather that information through just straight voltage and current.
So the voltage and current comes out we use that and translate it
in exactly the same manner we do with vibration. Matter of fact,
most vibration analysts will recognize most of the signatures we
look at when we're looking at squiggly lines. The difference is you
have to cross your eyes and stand on your head, but that's about
it. Allen Hall: So the Empath system, from what I've seen online,
it measures a couple of voltages and some currents on some wires,
which maybe you can describe what you're actually measuring there.
Howard Penrose: If we're doing the generator in a wind turbine
we're measuring the voltage and current directly off the stator. If
we're doing the generator in a wind turbine we're measuring the
voltage and current directly off the stator. So if my transformer
is uptower, that data has to come from uptower. If the data, if the
transformer is downtower, say in a GE or some of the other
machines, I can take that data downtower, which I prefer, to be
perfectly honest. But the idea is you go in you clamp on to three
phases of current and three phases of voltage for optimal voltage.
analysis. Really, if I'm just analyzing the components, I just need
one good phase, right? One, one sinusoidal phase. There's a lot of
things that happen electrically in a machine, in a wind turbine,
that are odd as compared to other types of generators. So we have
to work with that. And of course, whether I'm looking at a DFIG I
like to call certain designs S FIG. Where I don't have a feed to
the rotor, I just have a switching system, such as in the old
Suzlons. Or whether it's an induction machine or a permanent magnet
machine, each one is handled just a little differently, although
the signatures are the same. Allen Hall: So you're measuring three
voltages, three currents. On those signals is the power that's
coming from the generator, basically. But there's other things on
top of that. What electrical signals are on top of that, those
power signals? Howard Penrose: Every movement, every torsional
issue, every component from the transformer to the blades. In a
defig even in some of the newer ones and one or two older designs
that have the dual planetary gear set. We just added this as a
matter of fact, in American clean power, we just add the, into the
gearbox playbook, electrical signature analysis is one of the
prognostics for the gearbox. Through the air gap, we get to see.
The transformer, we get to see all of the components in the
generator that includes the bearings the Y rings and the rotor,
which that's, I think that's one of the most popular reasons that
were used is to define fracturing Y rings, and we'll see those 14
months out. And then even wedge issues of either vibrating or
missing wedges in certain stator designs. Then we'll see coupling
issues. We'll see all of the bearings in the gearbox, including the
planetary bearings. We will see all the gears in the gearbox. I
can't tell you if it's broken, cracked, or whatever, but I can tell
you that there's something wrong. And not only that, I can tell you
how much energy is being lost across that defect. And then the main
bearings, we'll even see when we have lubrication issues. One of
the most common is when the lubrication is not changed out properly
and you get dried grease at the bottom. We'll read that as an outer
race signature. And then finally, if the blades aren't aligned
right, they don't, they're not turned correctly within a couple of
degrees. We will see that as a blade pass as the impulse as it, as
each blade passes the tower. You'll see that variation, which can
get tricky because certain designs now start to turn the blade a
little bit based upon wind gusts and what LIDAR picks up coming at
the wind tower. Just by the way, what we didn't include is the fact
that I'm the chair of standards for ACP for wind. In the United
States. So yeah, I have a little idea of what's going on with the
turbines. Allen Hall: Just a tiny bit. Now, let me give a little,
just talk about your background just for a second here, because I
think it's important. You're you started in the Navy. You're from,
originally from Canada, right? You came to the States and then you
enlisted in the Navy. Howard Penrose: I'm dual. So I was born in
Michigan while my dad was finishing his doctorate at University of
Michigan. Then he headed up the fisheries department in St. John's,
Newfoundland, which makes me an official Newfie. So I joined the
Navy. My worst class in A school was electric motors and
generators. So I decided it was going to be my best subject. As I
was one of the first hundred on board the Theodore Roosevelt, an
aircraft carrier, and they said, what do you want to do? And I
said, I want motors. And generators. I was a a conventional
electrician, not a nuclear power electrician. So they put me down
there and, um, basically being one of the first hundred, I knew
everybody. As a matter of fact, the nickname MotorDoc came from the
captain of the ship back when I was 19 years old. He authorized me
to become the youngest electric motor repair journeyman in the Navy
ever. I think to this day, so you have to sign up for six more
years to get it. I didn't have to I went to motor rewind school. I
went to all the theoretical schools. I was enlisted. I got
meritoriously advanced through E5 by the time I was 20. So I spent
two years in a chief's position running a motor repair shop as a
journeyman on an aircraft carrier. Allen Hall: It takes a person
like you that has the hand on hands on experience. Plus, a little
bit of book knowledge, plus some education, and then have that kind
of percolate for several years to go, okay, there is something to
electrical signature analysis, and it's real and to decode it. I
think that's the hardest part,