A new diagnosis of broken rotor bar fault extent in three phase squirrel cage induction motor

•A new broken bar fault extent diagnostic approach under varying load.•WFA based model to provide parameters under different load fault.•A novel criterion is developed to assess rotor fault severity.

This paper proposes a new induction motor broken bar fault extent diagnostic approach under varying load conditions based on wavelet coefficients of stator current in a specific frequency band. In this paper, winding function approach (WFA) is used to develop a mathematical model to provide indication references for parameters under different load levels and different fault cases. It is shown that rise of number of broken bars and load levels increases amplitude of the particular side band components of the stator currents in faulty case. Stator current, rotor speed and torque are used to demonstrate the relationship between these parameters and broken rotor bar severity. An induction motor with 1, 2 and 3 broken bars and the motor with 3 broken bars in experiment at no-load, 50% and 100% load are investigated. A novel criterion is then developed to assess rotor fault severity based on the stator current and the rotor speed. Simulations and experimental results confirm the validity of the proposed approach.