Super System: A Hydroelectric Unit Condition Monitoring System in Operation at Hydro-Quebec

The knowledge of the status and the dynamic behavior of a hydroelectric unit at any time is a major asset to optimize and to timely plan maintenance activities. That knowledge can become available through a user-friendly on-line monitoring system capable of processing and storing a large amount of data, retrievable in various meaningful configurations.After eight year of research and development, Hydro-Québec started the implementation of a monitoring system at the end of 1993. This implementation is in progress reaching all Hydro-Québec’s hydraulic units rated 100 MW and up and most of the smaller capacity units. The system is presently operational on more than (65) hydroelectric units in Brisay, LG1 (La Grande-1), LG2, LG3, LG4 , LA1 (LAFORGE-1) and Manic-5 plants.Our objective in this paper is to show how machine condition monitoring can help solving maintenance problems. We will first describe what are the preventive maintenance goals that led to the decision of implementing such a system; how the design criteria has been chosen and what are the developments breakthroughs realized to reach these maintenance goals. Then, we will use recently acquired real life data to illustrate how data available from a monitoring system can help in the diagnostic of the machines’ condition. Finally, we will discuss some problems encountered during implementation and their solutions.