• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.32 no.6
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• pp.189-194
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• 2016

Wear debris in lubricating oil can be indicative of potential damage to mechanical parts in rotating and reciprocating machinery. Therefore, on-line or in-line monitoring of lubricating components in machinery is of great importance. This work presents a device based on inductive measurement of lubricating oil to detect magnetic wear particles in a tested volume. The circuit in the device consists of Maxwell Bridge and LVDT to measure inductance differences between pure and contaminated oil. The device detects the passage of ferrous particles by monitoring inductance change in a coil. The sensing principle is initially demonstrated at the microscale using a solenoid. The device is then tested using iron particles ranging from $50{\mu}m$ to $100{\mu}m$, which are often found in severely worn mechanical components. The test results show that the device is capable of detecting and distinguishing ferrous particles in lubricating oil. The design concept demonstrated here can be extended to an in-line monitoring device for real-time monitoring of ferrous debris particles. A simulation using the CST code is performed to better understand the inductive response in the presence of magnetic bodies in the oil. The CST simulation further verifies the effectiveness of inductance measurement for monitoring magnetic particles within a tube.

• Particle and aerosol research
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.31-42
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• 2023

The charge and magnetic characteristics of LM (Low-metallic) and NAO (Non-asbestos-organic) brake wear particles were analyzed. The ratio of charged particles from total particles is about 86% of the LM pad and about 92% of the NAO pad. Number of charge per particle from the NAO pad is also higher than that of the LM pad. The ratio of magnetic particles from total particles increases with the particle size. The ratio of magnetic particles from the LM pad is about 15% for the particles with the size of 1 ㎛, and about 74% for ones with 5 ㎛. The ratio from the NAO pad is about 5% for the particles with the size from 0.5 ㎛ to 2 ㎛, and about 80% for the particles with 5 ㎛. Through the analysis of the components of the two pads with SEM-EDS (Scanning Electron Microscopy - Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy), it was found that the LM pad was occupied with more iron fraction than the NAO pad and that PM_2.5-10 was occupied with more iron fraction than PM_2.5. The particles smaller than 10 ㎛ (i.e. PM₁₀) from the LM pad contained about 83% of charged particles, about 43% of magnetic particles, and about 93% of charged or magnetic particles. PM₁₀ from the NAO pad contained about 88% of charged particles, about 15% of magnetic particles, and about 89% of charged or magnetic particles.