OnPerformance.Lab

Unlock the true potential of your hydropower plant data.

This is an alternative description that is displayed if the image could not be loaded

This is an alternative description that is displayed if the image could not be loaded

Solution & Benefits

The OnPerformance.Lab helps hydropower operators to reduce maintenance costs and increase availability by analysing operations and maintenance data.

The Lab enables you to:

Make smarter decisions

Lab experts provide regular health reports based on the data provided by you through an easy drag & drop upload function. The software used by our experts to create the reports ensure fast delivery at an attractive price.

Solve troubleshootings faster

Through an user friendly interface, data and information can be shared with the OnPerformance.Lab at any time. The lab experts will provide fast and easily understandable recommendations and guidelines to solve the problem through the plattform.

Begin the data journey

As connecting your entire power plant to the cloud promises many advantages, there are also many barriers and costs. Voith has discovered and fulfills the need for an easy to implement process without investing millions into connectivity. Through the OnPerformance.Lab hydro operators receive many of the same benefits a connected plant would offer but in a much easier way.

Stories of our clients

Our Service

Remote Troubleshooting of excessive relative bearing vibration of the generator

What was the challenge?

The customer recorded high levels of relative vibrations at the upper guide bearing of the generator which several times caused alarm warnings. The vibrations were around border C/D of ISO 7919-5. Without a planned outage the local staff wasn’t able to identify the root cause. Voith was asked to access remotely and perform a troubleshooting.

What did Voith do?

Voith’s service team collected and analyzed data using the remote access to the power plant monitoring system. The dataset was recorded while the unit was running at different modes of operation, from steady state to maximum load. With the data the team made a complete vibration analysis. The high vibration root cause was identified and quantified as a combination of the upper generator shaft misalignment (60%) and the generator rotor unbalance (40%).

What was the value to the customer?

Voith reduced 35% of the shaft vibration through rotor balancing and eliminated the alarm warnings in all operation condition. A possible improvement on the vibration reduction through a shaft alignment can be adequately planed. This measure avoided an outage of a 150 MW unit for at least 3 weeks for unplanned corrections on the shaft alignment. This is estimated to have avoided approximately €226,800 in costs (based on average production loss).

Our Service

Health check of the hydraulic machine of pump turbine unit

What was the challenge?

The customer recorded high relative vibration levels on the runner blade movement during winter time. Voith was asked to access remotely in regular intervals to create health reports.

What did Voith do?

Voith’s service team collected and analyzed data of the unit from the condition monitoring system. Customized reports were created with visual charts, interpretations on anomalies and inspection recommendations on a regular basis. Additionally, a 24/7 remote support was established to support with complex data analyses.

What was the value to the customer?

The report provides the level of transparency that allows the plant to act preventively on certain system subcomponents. The availability of a remote expert allowed the plant to solve problems faster with an increase in availability and with less effort on site.

Our Service

Remote Troubleshooting of excessive vibrations on the pelton runner

What was the challenge?

The machine suffered some trips (protection system stops the unit automatically) without that the local staff could identify the root cause.

What did Voith do?

Voith's service team collected and analyzed data representing the vibration levels and operative parameters an engineer remotely was able to understand how the nozzles have been applied by the customer during operation. Through a data analysis it was understood that the way the nozzles are operating was inefficient. This was the root cause of the vibration. We helped the customer define a new pattern for operating the nozzles.

What was the value to the customer?

By adjusting the nozzle installation damages to the machines could be avoided and the expected lifetime of the shaft line components increased. This is estimated to have avoided approximately €52,560 (4% availability ) in costs (based on European average production loss.)

How it works

The OnPerformance.Lab web interface is where all information comes together. To be able to ensure a clean and fast data exchange a few steps are required.

On-site assessment of all condition monitoring systems incl. sensors by the OnPerformance.Lab team.
Hydro operator sets analysis priority and uploads data on the plattform.
OnPerformance.Lab assesses machine health.
Hydro operator reviews the recommendations.
Reports and recommendations are continuously updated based on clients needs.

Request Demo

By providing your name and your email we will send you a link with which you will have access to a demo of the OnPerformance.Lab.

With Voith forward

The OnPerformance.Lab brings 150 years of Voith engineering experience into your team.

Our Experts

Dr. Paul Weber

Technical Lead

Paul has an interdisciplinary background in mechanical engineering, mathematics and computer science. Holding a PhD in engineering, he combines his in-depth knowledge of turbomachinery with his experience in physical modeling and machine learning algorithms. As the technical lead of the OnPerformance.Lab, Paul stimulates innovative approaches and guides the development of customer oriented solutions.

Paulo Teixeira

Maintenance & Condition Monitoring Expert

Paulo Teixeira is an expert in health assessments and troubleshooting of hydro units. With over 30 years of experience in erection, commissioning and maintenance of large hydropower plants he solved problems for hydro operators all around the world. He holds a degree in mechanical engineering, a Master’s degree in vibration and acoustics and speaks German, English, Spanish and Portuguese."

José Nieto Diaz

Condition Monitoring Expert

José Nieto Diaz is the condition monitoring expert of the Lab. He has over 15 years of experience in vibration diagnosis and is also the product manager of OnCare.Health, Voith’s condition monitoring system. He holds a master’s degree in electrical engineering and speaks Spanish, English, French, Italian, Galician and German.

Thierre Zulzke Penteado

Vibration & Troubleshooting Expert

Thierre Zulzke Penteado has over 12 years of experience in numerical models for structural and fluid-dynamics analysis and experience in vibration measurements and troubleshooting for hydropower plants. He holds a Master’s degree in energy and fluid dynamics and speaks Portuguese, English and Spanish.

Frequently Asked Questions

How is the data transferred?

You have two options:

Manually via the OnPerformance.Lab platform. For this you only need to log-in on the website and upload the file you want analysed via drag & drop.
Automatically via a remote server. You are in control of the frequency and amount of data you want to the Lab to transfer.

Where is the data stored?

The data is stored on Voith’s local servers at its headquarter in Heidenheim, Germany.

In which format should I upload the data?

The most convenient format is .csv as most IT systems are likely to generate such format. If your systems only allow other types of formats, our experts will analyse the exploitability.

What components in a hydropower plant is the OnPerformance.Lab analysing?

Currently the Lab is offering services for the electric and hydraulic generating unit.

What does a report entail?

A standard report includes the analysis of all generating units, comparing them to older data points, benchmarking them to each other and correlating it to operations data. Our experts then give recommendations for maintenance planning and life time prediction.

How much does it cost?

We have different pricing models depending on your needs. As we are just rolling out the OnPerformance.Lab you can benefit now from extensive discounts. Contact us now to receive more information.

How often are reports created?

We recommend one report per month per hydro unit. Quarterly and half year reports are also possible.

We don’t have centralized data storage. Can we still use the service?

Yes. Our experts will help you to explain how data can be extracted and transferred to the OnPerformance.Lab, no matter what IT infrastructure you have in your plants.