Wind Industry

Preventing damage and keep turbines turning in all weathers

Specifying a Vibration Sensor

Volatile global economic conditions and ever tougher regulation is making it increasingly difficult to pulp and paper producers, and for converters, to protect their operating margins. The situation is make tougher by rising energy and raw material costs, as well as the challenges of meeting health, safety and environmental legislation.

As a result, mills are looking for methods of reducing operating costs, one of which is to minimise maintenance activities, while optimising plant availability and uptime. Key to this process are techniques such as predictive and preventative maintenance using vibration monitoring as a key indicator of machine health.

At Hansford Sensors we manufacture a full range of vibration sensors to help your business meet the challenges of monitoring and maintaining a wide range of production machinery, including forming, pressing, drying and finishing systems.

Factors to consider

Selecting the best accelerometer or vibration sensor for metals processing depends on a number of factors. These include:

  • Availability of the plant
  • Cost of breakdown
  • Criticality of the machine/impact on the production process
  • Access to machine, guarding, health and safety implications
  • Environmental factors

We can provide solutions for both online and offline monitoring, with all our industrial accelerometers being designed for use in the toughest environments, including hazardous areas.

Typical solutions for the Wind Industry

Low Frequency Movements

A typical wind turbine has eight accelerometers installed. These are normally based on our improved response, low frequency HS-100SF vibration sensors, designed especially for monitoring relatively slow (low frequency) movements. These are customised to each application and are generally either 100mV/g or higher sensitivity 250 and 500mV/g devices.

General Purpose Accelerometers

Our HS-100 accelerometers are also ideal for use in wind turbines, and are available with the option of integral armoured cable and quick-fit connectors. For applications with restricted access, our M12 side entry accelerometer, with separate M12 cable assemblies, can also be used.

For new OEM Builds

For new OEM builds, most of our units are supplied with M8 mountings. These are prepared for the spot face and then drilled to M8. For retro-fitted applications, or where it is impractical to drill the enclosure tough glue pads can also be used.

Junction & Connection Boxes

Many projects include a local junction box (HS-JE), which accommodates the accelerometer cabling at the top of the wind turbine and then, dependant on the exact configuration, multi-core cable can be connected and fed back down to ground level for termination into a monitoring system or switch box.

Outlining the opportunity to promote the use of accelerometers in wind.

A white paper from Hansford Sensors.

Global Customer Service & Support

We have a global network of sales partners, backed by the resources of our central product design, manufacturing and customer centre in the UK. Our sales partners include vibration analysts, consultants and system builders and integrators. Each is fully trained, experienced in meeting the challenges of vibration monitoring in a wide range of industrial applications and capable of providing dedicated local technical, engineering and customer service, wherever you are in the world.

For fast, friendly advice, and to learn more about our products, please contact our sales team.