Sensing machine elements as enablers of comprehensive digitization – A review

Several machine elements, for example roller bearings, embody physical effects that can be exploited to evoke a sensorial effect. The utilization of these effects results in so-called sensing machine elements, which might turn out to be an enabler for the digitalization of mechanical systems. Sensor-integration offers a starting point to connect these basic elements of engineering design to embedded systems, so that a point of contact for cyber physical systems arises. This novel research topic is gaining momentum with a potential impact on production machinery since the goal is to provide high quality measurement data out of positions from inside the process of interest (called in-situ measuring), enabling new functionality on a system level. The coverage of this area comes along with development difficulties so that there are only few concepts mature enough for the mass market. The challenges are ranging from energy supply in rotating systems, over data transfer across system borders up to robustness of the sensorial concept of the machine element in the application environment. The presentation and the corresponding paper cover a systematic classification of machine elements and explains sample concepts. Research challenges as well as opportunities in future applications are described with emphasis on applications in production technology for electric drive.