momac Group

MetalSCAN - Effective and reliable online monitoring for circulating oil lubricated gearboxes and bearings.

MetalSCAN 3000 detects damages to bearings and gears, already several months before arising the failure. Consequently, planned and cost-optimal repairs are getting possible due to the early detection!

MetalSCAN 3000 offers, regarding effectiveness and clearness, a reliable and up to now unsurpassed online monitoring of circulating oil lubricated gearboxes.

MetalSCAN – Online Condition Monitoring for gearboxes

Low-cost and reliable online condition monitoring for gearboxes with oil circulating lubrication

  • inductive metal particle counting
  • can also be used in turbid/dark oils
  • proven technology from aviation, marine and gas turbine technology
  • low investment costs
  • NO current operating costs for analyses or maintenance
  • through reliability confirmed by NASA investigation
  • recognized by leading insurance companies
  • installed over 4,000 times
Deckblatt des MetalSCAN-Flyers der momac Group

Flyer momac MetalSCAN

Precise and cost-effective online condition monitoring for circulating oil lubricated gearboxes. A flyer for online gearbox monitoring via MetalSCAN you will find in our PDF-Flyer for downloading.

Monitoring of gearboxes (online / offline)

For detecting a damage of gearbox early and reliably, highly loaded or especially production-relevant gearboxes are either to be checked regularly or monitored permanently (a surprising failure would cause high production downtime costs).

There are many technical possibilities for monitoring / checking highly loaded gearboxes.

  • Gearbox inspections / gearbox assessments by opening the gearboxes       or
  • endoscopic inspections of gearboxes

are known methods for monitoring gearboxes. But they can only be carried out at standstill.

  • Offline vibration measurements    and
  • oil inspections

at regular intervals increase the probability for detecting a damage, but often they do not provide the required safety to detect a gearbox damage so early that a loss of production can be avoided in every case.

For detecting initial damages to bearings and gear parts of gearboxes reliably, it is absolutely necessary to monitor the gearbox continuously.

Today, this gearbox monitoring is usually carried out with vibration-based condition monitoring systems (CMS). In spite of the fact that automated alarming in the event of anomalies is partly already quite advanced, these condition monitoring systems for gearboxes require usually a detailed analysis of the measured vibration images (waveforms) for obtaining a statement about the degree of damage to the gearbox or even a prognosis concerning the damage development during continued operation.

There is also the fact that operational vibrations can lead to more frequent false alarm messages and that the vibrations of the undamaged new gearbox must be known for the correct calibration of vibration-based monitoring systems (condition monitoring systems) for gearboxes.
Therefore, a subsequent installation of a vibration-based online monitoring system for gearboxes (CMS) is often impossible or requires extensive experience and repeated recalibration for guaranteeing that the system will function later correctly.

In addition to technical advantages, MetalSCAN offers here financial advantages too. Inform yourself on this page about the advantages of monitoring oil-lubricated gearboxes by means of inductive particle counting, fully automated, without operating costs, with easy retrofitting and guaranteed detection of gear damages and bearing damages on gearboxes.

Gearbox monitoring – what’s more expensive:
Online or Offline?

Whether an effective gearbox monitoring by means of online condition monitoring (CMS) or by regular inspection via offline vibration measurement, video endoscopy or oil inspection/oil analysis is less expensive, that was discussed at length by maintenance engineers. Up to now, the problem could not be answered globally!

Since the inexpensive and yet absolutely reliable online condition monitoring system MetalSCAN has been available on the market, the online monitoring of gearboxes is not more expensive than the regular offline inspection of gearboxes.

Furthermore, there is the security against unforeseen damages with long production interruptions due to lack of spare parts exceeding usually the repair costs of the failed gearbox several times.

Contact us, we are pleased to advise you on the subject of condition monitoring for your gearboxes.

Early detection of gear damage reduces downtime and repair costs

Knowing early when bearings or gearing parts are failing, not only ensures a continuous operating process but also reduces repair costs.

MetalSCAN is a highly efficient tool for achieving this goal with low investment and without expensive analyses (current costs).

The MetalSCAN system consists of an inductive sensor and an alarm module (optional) which can be omitted when integrating the sensor signal into existing monitoring or control systems (e.g. vibration-based CMS, system control).

Due to the design of sensor, adapted to the SAE flange form (see attached data sheets), the installation of the sensor, by part of customer, into the return flow of the lubricating oil circuit (e.g. directly upstream of the pump) is easily possible. If required, we can also install the sensor for you.

The selection of sensor (8/25/38mm) is essentially determined by the minimum flow rate of oil (see minimum flow rate required in the MetalSCAN Flyer). In principle, the sensor diameter should be as small as possible, but nevertheless large enough so that no impermissible back pressure occurs in front of the sensor.

In contrast to the known optical particle counters, the sensor counts only the metallic particles in the lubricating oil and can also be used in contaminated/turbid oil. Impurities in the oil such as water, soot, plastics etc. as well as air bubbles do not affect the analysis.

As the system does not require any reference values for detecting a damage, it can also be used with pre-damaged gearboxes for damage tracking. Worldwide, more than 10,000 sensors are used successfully in the aerospace, the gas turbine technology as well as in industrial, marine and wind power gearboxes. All sensors are self-monitoring (sensor error, cable break) as well as maintenance- and recalibration- free. Our All-in-One MetalSCAN units are equipped with sensor, bypass filter and communication unit and can therefore be used immediately and independently.

Also there are possible the external monitoring of the trends as well as the visualization of particle development via Internet (to be called password-protected via standard web browser).

The MetalSCAN principle:

Any damage to gearbox produces metallic abrasion already at early stage. As the number of metal particles per unit time correlates with the size of damage, any developing damage and its further development are recognized without any doubt. Even damages to planetary bearings and slowly rotating bearings, difficult/late or not to be monitored with other methods, are detected early and reliably.

The evaluation impresses with its simplicity:

If the sensor does not count excessive numbers of particles, there is no damage to the gearbox! When counting increased values, there is no doubt that there is an incipient damage! The number of metal particles correlates with the damage. Therefore, the damage development can be traced without further diagnoses. Reference data are not required. Consequently, the subsequent installation is possible at any time, even on already pre-damaged gearboxes.

The optional alarm module can be installed anywhere (up to 100 m away from the sensor) and has a graphic display for clear text indication of:

– number of the scanned metal particles
– operating condition
– faults
– graphic trend display

Furthermore, the alarm module is equipped with indicator lights for displaying when warning limits have been exceeded as well as with various digital outputs which can be assigned according to customer requirements. If required, several sensors can be connected to an appropriately prepared alarm module.

The MetalSCAN sensors can also be connected directly to existing control/monitoring systems. Please ask for the electrical connection diagram. We are pleased to send you the same in advance.

With pleasure we are at your disposal for any questions you may have, in particular regarding the selection and installation of the sensor as well as the connection to existing plant control systems.

Tested quality

We are certified according to DIN EN ISO 9001:2015 and OHSAS 18001:2007 as well as NLF/ISO OSH 2001

Foter momac Group Zertifizierungen
Repair of industrial gearboxes, special gearboxes from all manufacturers

More details concerning our division -Gearboxes- are to be taken from our topic page under: getriebe-instandhaltung.de