Bearing Fault Analysis of BLDC Motor for Electric Scooter Application

Abstract

In this paper, the bearing faults analysis of the brushless DC motor is presented. The research method is based on the analysis of the vibration signal of healthy as well as faulty bearings by the identification of specific frequencies on the vibration spectrum. For the experiment, the most common faults were inflicted on the bearings. As the used motor is intended for electric scooter applications, seven different damages were chosen, which are highly likely to occur during the scooter operation. The main bearing faults and the possibility of fault monitoring are addressed. The vibration data are gathered by the acceleration sensors placed on the motor at different locations and the spectrum analysis is performed using the fast Fourier transform. The variation in the amplitude of the frequency harmonics particularly the fundamental component is presented as a fault indicator.