Skyler Detects Advanced Bearing Fault in Gas Turbine Starter Motor

SKYLER

The Challenge

A remote peaker plant with four GE 7E gas turbines had no way to monitor its 800HP starter motors. These systems run on irregular, demand-driven schedules ramping from cold to full power in under 30 minutes. Route-based vibration monitoring wasn’t possible.

With no predictability, critical components like torque converters remained unmonitored and exposed to risk.

Demodulated spectrum reveals BPFI harmonics with shaft speed sidebands,
periodic high energy impacts visible in the acceleration time wave once per every
motor shaft revolution.

The Skyler Solution

Skyler deployed wireless vibration sensors with auto-triggered capture, enabling dense data collection only during startup events.

Within a month of installing Skyler’s auto-triggered vibration sensors, startup data revealed one unit with peak-to-peak acceleration levels around 30G. Spectral analysis matched BPFO and BPFI fault signatures tied to the SKF 6315 bearing—confirming an advanced motor bearing failure. Since the gas turbine unit is containerized, full motor replacement would have required structural disassembly.

Instead, the plant coordinated with HECO specialists to perform an on-site bearing replacement, avoiding major downtime. With early fault detection, the plant avoided catastrophic failure without major disassembly.

Skyler delivered actionable insights, and the maintenance team delivered results.

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