Paper Ref: S1504_P0330

3rd International Conference on Integrity, Reliability and Failure, Porto/Portugal, 20-24 July 2009

IDENTIFICATION OF THE CRANKSHAFT TORSIONAL

PROPERTIES OF A LARGE DIESEL ENGINE FROM A SINGLE
POINT MEASUREMENT OF ANGULAR SPEED
M. Desbazeille(1), R.B. Randall(2), F. Guillet(1), M. El Badaoui(1), C. Hoisnard(3)
(1)
Laboratoire dAnalyse des Signaux et des Processus Industriels, 42300 Roanne Cedex, France (e-mail:
mathieu.desbazeille@univ-st-etienne.fr)
(2)
School of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, The University of New South Wales, Sydney 2052,
Australia (e-mail: b.randall@unsw.edu.au)
(3)
EDF R&D Chatou, 78401 Chatou Cedex, France (e-mail: christian.hoisnard@edf.fr)

SYNOPSIS
This work reports on the identification of the crankshaft torsional properties of a large diesel
engine with the help of a single point measurement of angular speed. A dynamic model is
introduced with the assumption of a flexible crankshaft. Some of the model parameters are
determined and optimized with the help of actual measurements including a run-up in speed
which enables detection of the critical speeds. Simulations of the angular speed variations are
compared with actual measurements. Good results are obtained. This work also shows the
feasibility of monitoring large diesel engines by analyzing the instantaneous crankshaft
angular speed.
INTRODUCTION
Large diesel engines are widely used in many industrial applications such as the marine and
power industries. It is a very important issue to ensure reliability of these engines. Condition
monitoring can predict and therefore avoid undesirable failures of such equipment.
Crankshaft angular speed is a very convenient, economic and non-invasive measurement. The
latter is closely related to the gas pressure of all the cylinders and has drawn a lot of attention
in recent years. The results show that crankshaft angular speed is a relevant measurement that
could be used for diagnosis of combustion-related faults in conjunction with other condition
monitoring techniques. However, most researches dealt with four or six-cylinder engines
(Yang, 2001), (Taraza, 2001). Little attention has been paid to larger engines (Charles, 2007).
A large number of cylinders involves higher inertias, overlapping combustions and torsional
vibration modes which strongly complicate the analysis.
A model capable of simulating the angular speed both in healthy and faulty conditions, is
desirable. Indeed, analysis of this model might help to extract relevant parameters to identify
the condition.
This work aims at modeling the crankshaft angular speed of a twenty-cylinder engine. It
includes modeling both the crankshaft dynamical behavior and the in-cylinder pressure curve.
It is shown how to get a good simulation of the crankshaft torsional response by extracting the
crankshaft mechanical properties from experimental measurements. Simulations of the
angular speed at the crankshaft free end (prior to the damper) are compared with actual
measurements both in healthy and faulty conditions.

-1-

ENGINE CHARACTERISTICS AND EXPERIMENTAL SET-UP

The main diesel engine characteristics are reported in table 1. It is a high powered directinjection diesel engine designed by Wrtsil. This 50 degree V-20 engine develops 4 MW at
speed 1500 rpm. The crankshaft is about five meters long. The injection timing is not equallyspaced. It is alternately 22 and 50 in crank angle. Its large number of cylinders and its high
speed mean that at least two cylinders are in combustion phase at the same time. This engine
drives an emergency electrical power generator set in a nuclear plant. Figure 1 shows a sketch
of the power generator set with the cylinder numbering. A damper (Houdaille type) is fixed at
the crankshaft free end in order to damp the torsional vibrations. A flywheel is fixed on the
coupling between the diesel engine and the electrical generator. Its function is to reduce the
crankshaft angular speed variations at the coupling end.
Table 1. Engine characteristics.
Manufacturer
Wrtsil
Type
Diesel V50
Length width height (m)
6 2.6 3.3
Rated power (MW)
4
Cylinder number
20
Cylinder capacity (L)
200
Bore (mm)
240
Rotating speed (rpm)
1500
Injection timing ()
22 and 50

Crankshaft free end and damper

Coupling and flywheel

Diesel engine

B10

A10

B9

A9

B8

A8

B7

A7

B6

A6

B5

A5

B4

A4

B3

A3

B2

A2

B1

A1

Electrical
generator

Figure 1. Sketch of the power generator set with the cylinder numbering.

Experiments were carried out at 82% of the engine full load condition. The instantaneous
crankshaft angular speed variations were recorded at the crankshaft free end next to the
damper. The speed sensor was a laser rotational vibrometer (Polytec OFV-400). A one pulse
per revolution encoder was fixed on the camshaft. Tests were conducted in normal and in
faulty conditions. In the second case, the individual fuel pump in cylinder A6 was disturbed.
The injected fuel quantity was reduced 20% in comparison to the normal condition.
CRANKSHAFT DYNAMICAL BEHAVIOR MODELING
The crankshaft is modeled with a simpler system which is equivalent dynamically. As the
engine is very large, the assumption of a rigid crankshaft is no longer valid. A model with
assumption of a flexible crankshaft is established. It takes into consideration the torsional
vibration which causes twisting in the sections of the crankshaft. This system consists of
thirteen lumped inertias or dof (degrees of freedom) which are connected by torsionally
-2-

elastic springs (see figure 2). This kind of model has been widely used in mechanical
engineering (Mendes, 2008). The inertias respectively stand for the coupling and the
flywheel, the ten cranks and the inner and outer parts of the damper. It is assumed that the
angular speed variations of the electrical generator are negligible. As a consequence, the latter
can be considered as a fixed node.
Coupling and flywheel
j1
j2

Electrical
generator

j2

j2

j2

j3

Damper

j3

j2

j2

j2

j2
j5
j4

k1

dof:

Cranks

k2

k3

k3

k3

k3

k4

k3

k3

k3

k3

10

k5

11

k6

12

13

Figure 2. Crankshaft model.

The equivalent inertias and stiffnesses of the system were calculated from drawings, modeling
of the crankshaft with a CAD software and finite element method. Figure 3 shows a
geometrical model of a crank throw. The equivalent torsional stiffness was determined by
applying a constant torque to the crank and by clamping both extremities. The stiffness is the
ratio of the applied torque to the angular displacement divided by four. Inertias and stiffnesses
of the coupling and the damper were provided by the manufacturers (Vulkan and Geislinger
respectively). All these values are reported in table 2.
Force

j2

Fixed

2k2

2k2

Figure 3. Model of a crank throw.

A modal analysis can be performed in order to determine the natural frequencies and the
associated mode shapes of the system. The four first modes are represented in figure 4 and the
corresponding frequencies are reported in table 3 (second column). The first mode is the rigid
body mode due to the elastic coupling between the engine and the electrical generator. The

-3-

second mode is due to the damper. The deflection is maximal at the free end. The next modes
are the crankshaft torsional modes. The first of them is approximately a quarter of a sine
curve. All these modes have a very low deflection at the coupling end except for the rigid
body mode.
Table 2. Inertias and stiffnesses.
Inertia (kg.m)

Stiffness (106 N.m.rad-1)

j1 = 140
j2 = 7.5
j3 = 8
j4 = 0.75
j5 = 23.7

k1 = 0.5
k2 = 36
k3 = 24
k4 = 15
k5 = 8
k6 = 2

(a) mode 1

(b) mode 2

(c) mode 3

(d) mode 4
Figure 4. The four first mode shapes.

Table 3. Estimated and observed torsional resonance frequencies.

Mode

Estimated frequency (Hz)

Observed frequency (Hz)

1
2
3
4
5

7.2
33.2
63.0
132.4
210.2

9.4
37.3
51.8
125
200

The actual crankshaft angular speed variations were recorded during a run-up in speed.
Analysis of this run-up enables detection of the critical speeds as it induces a sweep in the
excitation frequencies. Figure 5 shows the spectrum of the transient part. The five first
torsional resonance frequencies seem to be visible. The fourth and the fifth modes are difficult
to localize precisely. These modes are not very strongly excited. Starting is realized by
injecting compressed-air into the cylinders under no load. Therefore, excitations applied to the
crankshaft may contain less high frequency components than in steady operation under no
-4-

load. Estimated and observed frequencies are compared in table 3. These frequencies are quite
close. Nevertheless, optimization algorithms, such as genetic algorithms, were used in order
to adjust the model parameters (inertias and stiffnesses) and to get the estimated and observed
frequencies as close as possible. Thus, a more accurate estimation of the mode shapes might
be expected. However, the best results were obtained by only slightly increasing the coupling
stiffness to increase the frequency of the first mode to be close to the actual one. The mode
shapes are not so much affected by this change. Non-linearities in the actual system could
explain for the reason why optimization does not lead to a better match. Indeed, the coupling
(the rubber component) and the damper could be expected to be non-linear. Angle varying
inertias instead of constant inertias also introduce non-linearities.

Figure 5. Spectrum of the angular speed variations during a run-up in speed.

The crankshaft dynamical behavior can be represented by mathematical functions such as the
mobility transfer functions. The latter represent the relation between the torque excitations
applied to the crankshaft and the crankshaft angular speed responses. These functions have
the following expressions:
n

Hij ( ) = j
r =1

Aijr
( ) + 2 j r r
2
r

(1)

Indices i and j respectively denote the response and the excitation dof (see figure 2). n is the
number of excited modes. is the frequency in radians per second. r and r are respectively
the natural frequency and the damping factor associated with the mode r. The damping factor
is a factor which characterizes how oscillations of a mode die down after a disturbance. Aijr is
a scalar whose magnitude depends on the location of the response dof i and the excitation dof
j with respect to nodes and anti-nodes of the mode r. The closer the response dof i and/or the
excitation dof j are to a node the lower is its magnitude. As a consequence, cylinders next to
the coupling have less contribution to the crankshaft angular speed variations as deflection of
the system is lower at the coupling end (see figure 4).
These functions were computed using the five first modes. The three first observed natural
frequencies were also considered instead of the estimated frequencies. The damping factors
were estimated by using the spectrum of the run-up in speed. In fact, these factors are related
to the -3 dB bandwidth around each resonance peak as described in figure 6. These factors are
defined as the ratio of half the -3 dB bandwidth fr to the resonance frequency fr:

-5-

fr
2 fr
The damping factors were consequently set to 0.1 for all the modes.

r =

(2)

Figure 6. Zoom in spectrum of the angular speed during a run-up.

IN-CYLINDER PRESSURE CURVE MODELING

The main excitations applied to crankshaft are the gas torque Tg and the inertia torque Ti. The
simplified expressions of these torques are (Harris, 2002):
sin(2 )

Tg ( ) = SRP( ) sin( ) +
2

(3)
sin(2 ) 3sin(3 )
2 2 sin( )
Ti ( ) = WrecR
+
+
2
4
4
is the crankshaft angle, P() is the in-cylinder pressure and is the mean angular speed. S,
R and Wrec are respectively the piston section, the crank radius and the reciprocating mass.
is the ratio between the connecting rod length and the crank radius. All these parameters are
known except for the in-cylinder pressure. A typical in-cylinder pressure curve is available at
75% of the engine full load condition (provided by the manufacturer). However, a model is
desirable to be able to simulate the in-cylinder pressure curve both in healthy and faulty
conditions.
The in-cylinder pressure P is the superposition of the compression/expansion and combustion
pressures. The compression/expansion contribution can easily be estimated by considering a
polytropic process:
PV = constant
(4)
The volume V depends on mechanical geometries and on the crankshaft position. is the
polytropic index of the fluid (a fuel/air mixture). Its value is typically in the range of 1.3 and
1.4. Modeling of the combustion contribution is more delicate. Phenomenological models are
widely used because of their simplicity. These models are zero-dimensional models which are
based on predicting the rate of heat released (RoHR) with predefined functions. Wiebes
function is one of the most used. As several stages are observed during the combustion
process (premixed and mixing-controlled phases for example), several Wiebes functions may

-6-

be superimposed in order to reproduce the RoHR closely. Figure 7 shows typical RoHRs with
the use of a single Wiebes function. Four parameters are required:

the ignition delay,

the combustion duration,
the combustion efficiency,
and a Wiebes function shape parameter (mv).

Figure 7. Modeling of the rate of heat released during combustion with a Wiebes function. INJ, SC TDC and
EC respectively denote the injection timing, the start of combustion, the Top Dead Center and the end of
combustion.

Then, the in-cylinder pressure is estimated with the well-known thermodynamic relation
between heat Q, pressure, P and volume V:

P
V
dV + cv
dP
(5)
cp cv
cp cv
cp and cv are the heat capacities of the fluid at constant pressure and volume respectively.

dQ = cp

The above parameters were set by curve-fitting with the actual measurement of the in-cylinder
pressure at 75% of the full load condition. The optimization process was performed in two
steps. A genetic algorithm was first used and provided a first guess to the well-known
Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm. The latter is very efficient. However, its performance
strongly depends on the initial estimate. A bad choice can lead to finding a local instead of a
global minimum. The use of a genetic algorithm as a first step minimizes this possibility.
Results of the curve-fitting are shown in table 4 and figure 8. An excellent match is obtained.
A single Wiebes function was used.
Table 4. Wiebes function parameters.
Ignition delay ()
19
Combustion duration ()
115
Combustion efficiency
0.95
Wiebes function shape parameter
0.45

-7-

Figure 8. In-cylinder pressure curve fitting.

SIMULATION OF THE CRANKSHAFT ANGULAR SPEED VARIATIONS

The crankshaft angular speed variations i at a response dof i (i=12 at the free end) are
expressed as the convolution between the torques TjA and TjB applied to the cranks on both
sides of the crankshaft (V engine) and the mobility transfer functions hij (expressed in the
angle domain):

11

11

i ( ) = hij ( ) Tj ( ) + hij ( ) Tj ( )
A

jA = 2

with

jB = 2

TjA( ) = Tg ( jA) + Ti ( jA)

TjB ( ) = Tg ( jB ) + Ti ( jB )

(6)

jA and jB are angular shifts which depend on the injection timing (not equally spaced). Figure
9 shows simulation of the angular speed variations at the crankshaft free end compared to the
actual measurement. The latter was resampled in the angle domain, averaged over several
cycles (750 cycles) and low-pass filtered at 250 Hz. A quite good match is obtained.

Figure 9. Simulation of the angular speed variations at the crankshaft free end.

A very good match can be obtained by optimizing the natural frequencies and the damping
factors (see figure 10). Optimization was realized with the Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm.
-8-

The estimated natural frequencies and damping factors are reported in table 6 and compared
to the initial ones. The damping factors were over-estimated when estimating from the run-up
in speed.

Figure 10. Simulation of the angular speed variations at the crankshaft free end with the optimized natural
frequencies and damping factors.
Table 6. Initial and optimized natural frequencies and damping factors.
Initial
Optimization
Mode
fr
fr
r
r
1
9.4
0.1
11.9
0.13
2
37.3
0.1
37.9
0.06
3
51.8
0.1
52.3
0.10
4
132.4
0.1
125.3
0.06
5
210.2
0.1
210.7
0.07

The model parameters, including mechanical and combustion parameters, were determined
and optimized in normal condition. Tests were also conducted in faulty condition with a
faulty fuel pump. Optimization was now used in order to detect and identify the faulty fuel
pump. All the parameters were kept constant except for the injected fuel quantities (twenty
variables). The model was optimized according to these variables as illustrated in figure 11.
Results are shown in figure 12. Fuel quantities are expressed as percentages in comparison
with the normal condition. The faulty fuel pump A6 is detected, identified and quantified. The
corresponding fuel reduction is very significant and very close to the actual one (to 20%).

CONCLUSIONS
In this paper, the crankshaft torsional properties of a twenty cylinder diesel engine were
identified with the help of a single point measurement of angular speed. The crankshaft was
modeled with the assumption of a flexible crankshaft. Some of the model parameters were
first determined by analyzing a run-up in speed. These parameters were then optimized by
curve-fitting with an actual measurement in steady state operation. A good match was
obtained between simulation and experimentation. Promising results were also obtained for a
diagnosis purpose. A combustion related fault was detected and localized by optimizing
combustion parameters in faulty condition.

-9-

Measured angular speed variations

Fuel quantities

Model

Estimated angular
speed variations
+/-

Error

Parameter adjustment
Figure 11. Optimization of the fuel quantities.

Figure 12. Optimization of the fuel quantity (in percentage) in faulty condition.

ACKNOWLEGMENTS
Mathieu Desbazeille held a doctoral fellowship from la Rgion Rhne-Alpes.

REFERENCES
P. Charles, L. Lidstone, F. Gu, and A.D. Ball. Research into flywheel torsional speed
variation for large diesel engine applications. In Proceedings of COMADEM 2007, Faro,
Portugal, June 13-15 2007.
C.M. Harris, A.G. Piersol, Harriss shock and vibration handbook fifth edition, McGrawHill, 2002.
J.B. Heywood. Internal combustion engine fundamentals, McGraw-Hill, 1988.

-10-

A. Mendes, P. Meirelles, D. Zampieri. Analysis of torsional vibration in internal combustion

engines: modelling and experimental validation Proceeding of the Institution of Mechanical
Engineers, Part K: Journal of Multi-body Dynamics, 222, 155-178, 2008.
D. Taraza, N. Henein, W. Bryzik, The frequency analysis of the crankshafts speed variation:
a reliable tool for the diesel engine diagnosis, Journal of Engineering for Gas Turbines and
Power, 123, 428-432, 2001.
I.T. Vibe. Brennverlauf und Kreisprozess von Verbrennungsmotoren, VEB-Verlag Technik,
Berlin, 1970.
J. Yang, L. Pu, Z. Wang, Y. Zhou and X. Yan. Fault detection in a diesel engine by analysing
the instantaneous angular speed. Mechanical Systems and Signal Processing, 2001, 15, 549564.

-11-