Applied Mechanics and Materials Submitted: 2016-02-27

ISSN: 1662-7482, Vol. 853, pp 463-467 Revised: 2016-04-20

doi:10.4028/www.scientific.net/AMM.853.463 Accepted: 2016-05-04
© 2017 Trans Tech Publications, Switzerland Online: 2016-09-30

Performance Monitoring Analysis of Liquid Ring Vacuum Pumps

Guangqi Qiua, Si Huangb, *, Lanlan Zhuc , Yu Chend and Jing Hee
South China University of Technology, Wushan Road381#, Tianhe District, Guangzhou 510640,
China
a
[email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected],
e
[email protected]

Keywords: Performance monitoring system; Liquid ring vacuum pump; Data acquisition; Fault
diagnosis.

Abstract. Liquid ring vacuum pump which uses rotating liquid as piston to abstract and compress gas
is a kind of rotating positive displacement pump. Its running state implies some fault information. To
capture performance levels of liquid ring vacuum pump, a comprehensive performance monitoring
system includes data acquisition, data reprocessing, data storage, abnormal judgment and fault alarm,
performance displaying was developed in this paper. Results showed that the performance levels of
liquid ring vacuum pump could be observed anytime by the monitoring system, the maintenance cost
could be reduced, pumps could be operated at the highest performance level as far as possible and the
reliability of pumps could be effectively improved by this monitoring system.

Introduction
Liquid ring vacuum pump is an important chemical machinery equipment that is widely and
frequently used in many industries such as petroleum, chemical, metallurgy, mine, electric power and
so on [1-4]. Once it goes wrong, which may lead to huge economic losses or even cause an accident.
Because of the interaction of operational environment factors, especially varied conditions, it is
difficult to set up the relationships between fault symptoms and fault causes by theoretical analysis. In
this case, failure mechanism of liquid ring vacuum pumps can not be effectively described, so that
mathematical modeling approaches suffer some limitations. Fortunately, instrumentation technology
has been one of the main available methods at present [5-6]. It is found that performance levels of
pumps can be effectively characterized by some indicators. These indicators of liquid ring vacuum
pumps are easily affected by operational conditions. If these characterized indicators can be on-line
monitored, the performance levels of liquid ring vacuum pumps will be captured, and the
maintenance schedule will be optimized. Hence, the operational time of near-zero downtime
performance is ensured, and the maintenance expenses are reduced [7].
Recently, there are lots of scholars pay highly attentions to the monitoring technology for
preventing the fault of the mechanical equipment [8-10]. Ning et al. developed a centrifugal pumps
state monitoring and analysis system. Results showed the system could acquire the performance
parameters, analyze these data, draw the conclusion, and help engineer manage the pumps [11]. Chun
et al. designed a monitoring system of injection pump durability tester based on fieldbus control
system for improving the working efficiency [12]. There are a series of reports being published, many
of which are concerned with centrifugal pump, but few are related to liquid ring vacuum pump.
To capture failure mechanism of liquid ring vacuum pumps, a performance monitoring system that
includes data acquisition, data reprocessing, data storage, abnormal judgment and fault alarm,
performance displaying was developed in this paper. Performance levels were real-time monitored, so
that pump could be maintained timely. To verify the availability and the accuracy of the monitoring
system, an experimental test facility was performed. Fault alert and fault diagnosis had been
implemented by setting a fixed threshold for each monitoring parameter.

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464 Innovation in Testing and Evaluation of Structural Integrity

Performance parameters
Fig. 1 shows schematic diagram of liquid ring vacuum pump. The three-phase induction motor is
used to drive and control the rotating speed of the impeller. Firstly, gas is sucked into liquid ring
vacuum pump from its inlet when the motor has been operating. Secondly, the gas is compressed
through liquid ring vacuum pump. Then the gas will be flowed into the liquid-vapor separator with a
fraction of working liquid. Finally, gas and working liquid are separated by the liquid-vapor separator.
The gas is discharged through its outlet while working liquid is sucked into liquid ring vacuum again
after cooled by the heat exchanger. Heat, such as pump invalid power or high temperature suction gas,
is produced in the work procedure of liquid ring vacuum pump. The heat exchanger function is
cooling working liquid by cooling water, thus working liquid temperature can be kept within a
reasonable range.
Discharge
Motor
vapor
Suction Liquid ring
vacuum pump

Heat exchanger Liquid liquid-vapor

Liquid separator

Cooling water

Fig. 1 Schematic diagram of liquid ring vacuum pump

According to analyze fault mechanism of liquid ring vacuum pump, the monitoring parameters and
corresponding sensors are determined finally, which are shown in Table 1. In practice, determination
of sensor must consider synthetically the following rules: sensor accuracy, sensitivity, linear range,
stability, frequency response characteristic, measuring methods and applications. Sensors must be
calibration before being measured, which can ensure the minimum error of collection data.
Table 1 Monitoring parameters and sensors
Monitoring parameter Parameter range Sensor Sensor range
Inlet air temperature 0~40°C Integrated 0~100°C
Outlet air temperature 0~50°C Temperature
Inlet liquid temperature 0~40°C transmitter
Outlet liquid temperature 0~50°C
Bearing temperature 0~80°C Temperature transmitter 0~100°C
Suction pressure 33~1013 hPa Pressure transmitter 0~1000 hPa
Discharge pressure atmosphere 0~160hPa
Air capacity 3
14.4~19.2 m /min Vortex shedding flowmeter 3
5~26 m /min
Liquid capacity 3
2.0~5.5 m /h
3
1.5~7.5 m /h
Power 18~30 kW Shaft power transmitter 0~38 kW
Rotational speed 980 r/min Tachometer transmitter 0~1200 r/min
Vibration ≤2.8mm/s Magnet-electrical vibration 20 mV/mm/s
velocity transducer

Apparatus Details
The main performance parameters such as temperature, pressure, flow rate, shaft power, speed,
vibration and so on, can be converted to electrical signals by the transmitters. The collected electrical
signals are processed, and transformed into the standard 0-5V voltage or standard 4-20mA current
signal. Additionally, the computer can process these digital signals through the data acquisition card
A/D conversion. Finally the transmission signals can be used for analyzing and processing, displaying
and storing by LabView software. Fig. 2 show layout of monitoring points and experimental
apparatus respectively. The experimental apparatus is mainly designed for performance parameters
 Applied Mechanics and Materials Vol. 853 465

testing. It contains some sensors and transmitters, a current input data acquisition card, a voltage input
data acquisition card, a NI compact DAQ chassis, an industrial personal computer and a vacuum unit
monitoring ark. The 4-20mA current signals are collected from the sensors such as temperature
transmitter, bearing temperature transmitter, tachometer transmitter, pressure transmitter, vortex
shedding flowmeter, and shaft power transmitter through the current input data acquisition card. The
0-5V voltage signals are collected from the vibration velocity transducer by the voltage input data
acquisition card. It is convenient to connect a laptop which is used for data display and data storage
because the compact DAQ platform provides a plug-and-play USB connection. In addition, the
compact DAQ platform is characterized by small volume, low power consumption, easy to carry.

(a) Experimental apparatus (b) Layout of monitoring points

Note: N.1—Air charge temperature; N.2—Discharge temperature; N.3—Inlet liquid temperature; N.4—Outlet
liquid temperature; N.5—Drive end bearing temperature; N.6—Non-driven-end bearing temperature; N.7—Suction
pressure; N.8—Discharge pressure; N.9—Air capacity; N.10—Liquid capacity; N.11—Power; N.12—Rotational
speed; N.13—X/Y/Z-direction vibration; N.14—Substructure vibration.
Fig. 2 Experimental facility
Data acquisition, data storage, data processing, alarm records and data display have been
implemented by writing a program in LabView software. Fig. 3 shows the interface of the monitoring
system which contains several modules, for instance, self-inspection, system setup, data acquisition,
administrator, and help. The data acquisition module contains four sub-modules: data display, data
analysis, alarm records, and data storage. Additionally, the observation value is more than the preset
threshold which is set for each performance parameter, the system will alarm.

Fig. 3 The display interface of the performance monitoring system

Results and Discussion

In this section, the rotational speed is 980 r/min, the performance parameters are collected during a
span time of 5 seconds when the test signal is steady through adjusted the pressure of inlet valve that
466 Innovation in Testing and Evaluation of Structural Integrity

is from atmospheric pressure to 33hPa. We select a sampling frequency of 256 Hz. Each parameter is
recorded and stored in a data file.
As the opening of the butterfly valve in the inlet pipe increasing, air capacity, suction gas
volume per unit time and suction pressure rise correspondingly, but liquid capacity, power, outlet air
temperature and outlet liquid temperature drop. Fig. 4 shows the monitoring values of temperature
and Y-direction vibration which are obtained by the monitoring system. Time domain analysis and
frequency domain analysis are utilized for processing and analyzing the tested data. While the
opening of the valve decreased, the situation will on the contrary. Pump is approximately in an
isothermal compression process. Due to working liquid compressed gas to do work, outlet air
temperature will be higher than inlet air temperature (It is always a small value, and it depends on
working liquid temperature). Non-driven-end bearing temperature is higher than drive end bearing
temperature. That is because two conical bearings are installed in the non-driven-end. Their tapered
rollers bear radial and axial joint loads, which is main radial load. But only one conical bearing is
installed in the drive-end, and its tapered roller mainly bears radial load. The fundamental frequency
980/60=16.3Hz of drive end bearing and pedestal are existed high amplitude. Their time-domain
curves are approximately Sine wave, which implies the rotor is initial imbalance.

Fig. 4 The monitoring value of temperature and Y-direction vibration

Fig. 5 Performance curves

 Applied Mechanics and Materials Vol. 853 467

The performance curves are calculated by time-average for each parameter. Simultaneously, the
performance curves can be also obtained when the rotational speed are 790 r/min, 880 r/min, 1100
r/min, 1170 r/min and 1300 r/min. Capacity curves and power curves are shown in Fig. 5. These
performance curves are based on operating conditions with dry air at a temperature of 20°C,
operating water at a temperature of 15°C, and discharge pressure of 1013mbar. The tolerance about
capacity and power should be in range of 10%. As inlet pressure absolute decreasing from 1013hpa to
33hpa, the capacity curves are steady firstly during a long time, and then it is declined dramatically,
but the power curves firstly rise, and then it decreases gradually.

Conclusions
With the trend requiring high-efficiency and high-reliability liquid ring vacuum pump, an
experimental facility was conducted for real-time monitoring running conditions, which was
successful to verify the availability and the accuracy of the performance monitoring system.
(1) Hardware constructional design, software design and post-debugging are conducted for the
monitoring system which realizes pumps running conditions monitoring. According to the monitoring
system, it is convenient to grasp the pumps performance levels in operational process.
(2) To obtain more potential fault information from the collected data, the signal is processing by
time domain analysis and frequency domain analysis. Additionally, a fixed threshold is set for each
performance parameter, Hence, fault diagnosis and fault alert have been implemented. It helped to
improve the reliability, availability, security and maintainability of liquid ring vacuum pump.

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