Detection of broken rotor bars of induction motors based on the combination of Hilbert envelope analysis and Shannon entropy

Abstract

Abstract Broken rotor bar (BRB) is one of the most common fault types of induction motors. One of the common methods to detect the broken rotor bars is the observation of the characteristic sideband frequencies in the stator current. If the motor is lightly loaded, the sideband harmonics are attached to the fundamental frequency of the main supply and the amplitudes of these harmonics are quite low. Therefore, it is difficult to detect the broken rotor bars under light loading conditions by using conventional motor current signature analysis (MCSA) methods. Moreover, in some cases, the sideband harmonics of fundamental frequency may exist although there is no rotor fault in induction motors due to load oscillations. Therefore, there is a risk for false broken rotor bars alarm with the existence of lower amplitude of harmonics. This paper provides an alternative approach for the detection of broken rotor bars by applying Hilbert envelope analysis along with Shannon entropy to stator current signals. The proposed method includes two-stage evaluation system to eliminate false BRB alarms such as detecting sidebands from envelope spectrum and calculating entropy rates from envelope signals. The results are verified experimentally under 25 %, 50 %, 75 % and 100 % loading conditions.