Identifying seeded defects in gearboxes with Acoustic Emission; Limitations

Opportunities exist for developing the Acoustic Emission (AE) technique on various forms of rotating machinery, such as gearboxes. This paper provides a short summary on recent developments in the application of AE to gear defect diagnosis, and, experimental results are presented that examine and explore the effectiveness of AE for seeded gear defect diagnosis. It is concluded that the application of AE to seeded gear defect detection is fraught with difficulties. The viability of the AE technique for seeded gear defect detection is also called into question, particularly if observations are made from the non-rotating components of a machine such as the bearing casing.