08/06/2026
Imbalance or something much worse?
Earlier this week, Gareth Hughes, Condition Monitoring Engineer and ISO CAT II Vibration Analyst, was called to a steel plant to balance a fan running at a high vibration of 64 mm/s RMS. It looked like a standard balancing job—until he connected our new wireless balancing tool.
The real-time vibration spectrum immediately revealed multiple synchronous and half-order harmonics. This was a textbook sign of severe rotating looseness, not imbalance!
Instead of blindly continuing to balance, he advised the customer to stop and inspect the machine. The result? A major crack in the impeller hub.
By identifying the true root cause early, he prevented a catastrophic failure and saved the customer from massive downtime and costs.
Don't just fix the symptoms—find the real problem with smart condition monitoring and expert analysis from Acoem.