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The performance of rolling element bearings is one of the machine quality measures in industry. The fatigue life and performance of rolling element bearings depends mainly on the dynamic characteristics of those bearings. This paper studied the effect of the internal radial clearance on the damping characteristics, natural modes of vibration, and fatigue life of rolling element bearings. Vibration modal analysis was performed on rolling bearings of the same size and type to measure their dynamic characteristics. These dynamic characteristics include the natural frequency of the first mode of vibration, damping, and amplitude of frequency response function at resonance. The internal radial clearances of these bearings were measured. A statistical analysis was performed to study the correlation between the internal radial clearance and the dynamic characteristics of rolling bearings. It was found that the damping ratio of the bearing assembly increased by reducing the internal radial clearance of the bearing. Similarly, rolling bearings that have large internal clearances showed short predicted fatigue life. It is concluded that the dynamic characteristics, and consequently the dynamic performance, of rolling bearings are significantly affected by the internal radial clearance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most important factors influencing ball bearings service life is its internal radial clearance. However, this parameter is also very complex because it depends on applied radial load and ball bearings dimensions, surface finish, and manufacturing materials. Thermal condition of ball bearings also significantly affects internal radial clearance. Despite many researches performed in order to find out relevant facts about different aspects of ball bearings thermal behaviour, only few of them are dealing with the real working conditions, where high concentration of solid contaminant particles is present. That is why the main goal of research presented in this paper was to establish statistically significant correlation between ball bearings temperatures, their working time, and concentration of contaminant particles in their grease. Because of especially difficult working conditions, the typical conveyor idlers bearings were selected as representative test samples and appropriate solid particles from open pit coal mines were used as artificial contaminants. Applied experimental methodology included thermographic inspection, as well as usage of custom designed test rig for ball bearings service life testing. Finally, by obtained experimental data processing in advanced software, statistically significant mathematical correlation between mentioned bearings characteristics was determined and applied in commonly used internal radial clearance equation. That is the most important contribution of performed research - the new equation and methodology for ball bearings internal clearance determination which could be used for eventual improvement of existing bearings service life equations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A gear-shaft-bearing-housing dynamic model is proposed to reveal the modulation between bearing and gear. • Vibration Characteristics of bearing clearances under the effect of gear meshing is investigated. • An indicator is proposed based on MSB-SE for bearing clearances monitoring. • A run-to-failure gearbox test rig is designed to verify the effectiveness of the proposed indicator. Internal radial clearance is a key factor influencing bearing fatigue life. Moreover, bearings inevitably suffer from various wears and tears, which result in gradual increase of clearance and shorten bearing life. Monitoring bearing clearance changes using vibration can effectively indicate the bearing wear and provide good leading time to perform maintenances. Previous studies show that vibration at ball pass frequency on outer race (BPFO) can be based for clearance monitoring. However, such clearance induced vibration has not been well understood, especially under complicated dynamic interactions such as in a gearbox system. To fill this gap, this paper presents a nonlinear gear-shaft-bearing-housing vibration model with fourteen degree of freedom (DOF) to investigate the vibration responses under the dynamic gear meshing force and progressively changed radial clearances at first. Then, the model was verified through a two-stage spur gearbox. Furthermore, bearing characteristics with different radial clearances under the influence of gear are revealed and indicator based on modulation signal bispectrum-sideband estimator (MSB-SE) was proposed. Finally, vibration data from a run-to-failure gearbox test rig was utilized to verify the effectiveness of the MSB-SE indicator for bearing clearances monitoring. Simulation results show that BPFO is modulated on gear meshing frequency (GMF) and BPFO amplitude from envelope spectrum increases with bearing clearances under the influence of gear meshing. Indicator based on MSB-SE, possessing the capability of purifying the interferences of gear meshing and strong noises, is effective to capture the variance of bearing clearances. The experiment based on a run-to-failure gearbox test rig provided evidence for the effectiveness of the proposed indicator, which is more accurate than BPFO amplitude from conventional envelope analysis and time-domain indicators, such as RMS and kurtosis. These findings are of significance for bearing fault diagnosis and maintenance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Rolling element bearings appear in nearly 90% of all rotating machinery. Their dynamic performance is often the limiting factor in the performance of the machines that use them. The specific construction of a bearing has a decisive influence on its dynamic behaviour. The paper defines a new vibration model of a rigid rotor supported by rolling element bearings. By application of the defined model, the parametric analysis of the influence of internal radial clearance value and number of rolling elements influence on rigid rotor vibrations in unloaded rolling element bearing was performed. The defined vibration model and parametric analysis were verified experimentally. The results of experimental analysis are also presented in this paper. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: This paper presents a model for investigating structural vibrations in rolling element bearings due to radial internal clearance. The mathematical formulation accounted for tangential motions of rolling elements as well as inner and outer races with sources of nonlinearity such as Hertzian contact force and internal radial clearance resulting transition from no contact to contact state between rolling elements and races. The contacts between rollers and races are treated as nonlinear springs and the springs act only in compression to simulate contact deformation and resulting force. The nonlinear stiffness is obtained by application of equations for the Hertzian elastic contact deformation theory. The effect of radial internal clearance for rotor bearing system in which rolling element bearings show periodic, quasi-periodic and chaotic behavior are analyzed. Time response, rotor trajectories, Poincarè maps and power spectra are used to elucidate and to illustrate the diversity of system behavior. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]