A condition monitoring (CM) system, installed and managed by industrial consultants AV Technology Ltd (AVT), is playing a small, yet vital, role at the new Prestwick Air Traffic Control Centre, Prestwick in Ayrshire.
Operated by NATS* (formerly National Air Traffic Services Ltd), Prestwick Centre, commenced live operations on 20 October 2009 when the Oceanic service transitioned into the new Prestwick Centre operations room. The fourth move, when Manchester Area Control operations transfer to the centre in January 2010, will complete transition activity and Prestwick Centre will be fully operational.
The AVT system is based on regular condition monitoring via accelerometers installed on 24 supply and extraction fans which are part of the centre’s critical air conditioning system.
Having encountered initial problems with two of the eight large 37 kW fans in the main equipment room, NATS decided they needed to continuously monitor the condition of all the fans so that any problems could be proactively identified and rectified before failure occurred. AVT were commissioned to design and install a permanent vibration monitoring system, which has involved the fitting of accelerometers at 120 points on and around the fan assemblies.
Vibration readings from the accelerometers are taken using AVT’s innovative Spi-VR® (Spectrum Inspection & Vibration Recorder) hand held data collector. Regular on site data collection is carried out by NATS’ maintenance contractor and then uploaded to a dedicated web portal managed by AVT vibration experts. Data is analysed and a monthly report issued to NATS with any unusual trends being highlighted for appropriate action.
During an initial monitoring routine NATS identified high vibration readings on one of the fans. The data was uploaded to the Spi-VR website for AVT to analyse; consequently more frequent readings were taken, which resulted in AVT recommending the fan to be shutdown as it seemed likely it could fail at any time.
A subsequent Root Cause Analysis (RCA) project carried out by AVT Senior Consulting Engineers helped NATS and the Fan Manufacturers to develop solutions to improve reliability and integrity of the machine installations to a satisfactory level, well ahead of the intended facility go-live date.
NATS’ Mechanical Manager at Prestwick Keith Hull highlighted the importance of the AVT CM system: “The air conditioning system is vital to the reliable operation of the Prestwick Centre. We are now confident that most abnormalities can be identified well in advance so that maintenance can be carried out in a planned and structured manner without disruption to the operation. Spi-VR makes data collection extremely straightforward and we have the peace of mind that we have the continued support of AVT’s condition monitoring experts.”