Quantification of condition indicator performance on a split torque gearbox

The requirement for higher energy density transmissions (lower weight) in helicopters has led to the development of the split torque gearbox (STG) to replace the traditional planetary gearbox by the drive train designer. This may pose a challenge for the current gear analysis methods used in health and usage monitoring systems (HUMS). Gear analysis uses time synchronous averages to separates in frequency gears that are physically close to a sensor. The effect of a large number of synchronous components (gears or bearing) in close proximity may significantly reduce the fault signal (reduce signal to noise ratio) and therefore reduce the effectiveness of current gear analysis algorithms. In this paper, quantification of condition indicator performance on a split torque gearbox is reported. The vibration signatures are processed through a number of gear analysis algorithms to quantify the gear fault performance. The performance metric is separability.