Integrate process monitoring

A key point in the topic of Industry 4.0 is always the monitoring and control of manufacturing and machining processes. MotorView, developed by BMR 2020, offers a powerful solution for integrating a process monitoring system for inverters and motors.

It is suitable for all applications where a spindle inverter system is used, such as milling machines, which often involve multiple operations with different cutters. Here, MotorView allows each machining step to be tracked directly.

Any machine can be equipped with this measuring device. This applies both to the design of new machines and to the retrofitting and reconditioning of older machines.

MotorView is divided into two components, a sensor part and a display part. The integration is very simple: The sensor part is simply clamped or looped into the motor cables between the inverter and the driven motor. As a result, the motor phases run through the device, which records and stores all the information about voltages and currents without affecting the sequence.

The display part is connected to it via a cable and graphically displays the recorded load status of the spindle. A digital and serial interface is provided for communication and integration with the machine control system.

"Motorview has its ear, so to speak, directly on the process and can capture and display data on load conditions of the spindle extremely sensitively" explains BMR development engineer, Dipl.-Ing. Frank Buchholz. "The load condition of the motor usually also maps the machining process, which enables valuable conclusions to be drawn as to whether the process is running properly or whether problems are imminent," Frank Buchholz continues.

This brings us back to the topic of Industry 4.0, since predictive maintenance, i.e. predictive tool control, can prevent unplanned machine downtime.

MotorView thus also becomes an instrument for quality assurance and, in the long term, contributes to cost reduction in production. By detecting a reduction in cutting performance due to dulling tools at an early stage, it gives the user the opportunity to change tools in good time, before process quality deteriorates or, in the worst case, the tool breaks.

In addition to these important functions, it detects other problems at an early stage, such as spindle bearing wear, motor cable failure, detection of control oscillations or parameterization errors in the drive system.

Due to the sensitive sensor technology, a direct mapping of the machining process is always possible.