Sensorless automated condition monitoring for the control of the predictive maintenance of machine tools

Modern manufacturing systems are characterized by numerous interacting machine tools each with sophisticated maintenance. In order to be competitive, it is possible to reduce the system downtime by applying sensorless automated condition monitoring (SACM). This paper presents newly developed and tested SACM-algorithms based only on signals which are available in position controlled drives such as position, speed and motor current. The algorithm is based on comparing current characteristic parameters with those which were taken when the machine was new. (C) 2009 CIRP.