Advanced Pump Performance Monitoring

The goal of this project is to develop a complete pump performance monitoring system that includes anadvanced sensor package and software analysis tool to continually monitor the pump efficiency and structural wear by accurately measuring temperature, pressure, pump vibration and impeller wear simultaneously. We are currently working on the development of a system that is capable of measuring wear on the impellers based on the clearance between the impeller blades, the wear plate and the pump housing. Our design does not require any modifications to the interior of the pump and therefore it is easy to implement. The sensor package will be inexpensive to produce and easily installed on existing industrial pumps. The impeller wear sensor would have to be installed and calibrated during retrofit.

Accurate measurement of impeller wear during operation would provide accurate determination and prediction of impeller lifetime and replacement scheduling. Stand-alone instrumentation will be developed for the sensors to allow for continuous data logging. One or more prototype systems will be installed in the field for data collection.