Predictive Maintenance Method and System of Mechanical Devices Based on Temperature Monitoring Using Digital Twins

A system for predictive maintenance of a device based on temperature monitoring, the system comprising:

• a. at least two temperature sensors respectively configured to measure an ambient temperature and a temperature of the device;
• b. at least one sensor configured to measure operational data of the device;
• c. a data acquisition unit configured to record a set of ambient temperatures and a corresponding set of device temperatures when the device is not in operation and to record operational data of the device when the device is in operation;
• d. a processing unit configured to:
• i. create a model that reproduces the variation of the device temperature based solely on the ambient temperature, said model being fed with the data recorded by the data acquisition unit and outputting a virtual ambient temperature;
• ii. calculate a relative device temperature by subtracting the virtual ambient temperature from a temperature of the device measured by said at least one temperature sensor;
• iii. calculate an additional temperature variation due to the device's operation by comparing the relative device temperature to a theoretical neutral temperature variation which is determined by applying the model of the virtual ambient temperature to a previous relative device temperature;
• iv. train a digital twin of the device with said recorded operational data of the device and said calculated additional temperature variation;
• v. use the trained digital twin to predict the temperature increase due to the device's operation based on at least some of its measured operational data and, based on the predicted temperature increase, calculate a predicted relative temperature of the device;
• vi. predict the absolute temperature of the device by adding the virtual ambient temperature to the predicted relative temperature;
• vii. detect an abnormal temperature by comparing the predicted absolute temperature to an actual measured temperature of the device and identifying a deviation that exceeds a predefined threshold;
• e. a communication module configured to transmit the detected abnormal temperature and associated data to a remote monitoring system or alert the user.