Tacholess Rotational Speed Estimation via The Integration of Continuous Wavelet Transform and Time-Dependent Autoregression

Abstract

Speed estimation is crucial to monitor the conditions of rotational machinery. Most speed measurements are carried out by installing encoders or tachometers inside the machines. In many cases, such method could be cumbersome or even inaccessible. This paper proposes a vibration-based speed estimation method. The vibration sensors are often cheaper and easier to install than angle encoders. In the proposed method, the continuous wavelet transform (CWT) is used as a preprocessing technique to extract the signal of importance. Then, the time-varying autoregressive (TAR) model is applied to analyze the rotational frequency. Additionally, the paper presents a fast algorithm for implementation. The proposed method is validated by both synthetic and empirical data.