YANG Hong 1, LIU Gang 2, LIU Yang 3, LI Jiang-hua 1

1. China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, Beijing 100038, China
2. Nanjing Power Supply Co., Nanjing 210008, China
3. Sinohydro Resources Ltd, Beijing 100048, China

Abstract: The current condition monitoring systems of hydroelectric generating units are still limited to achieve a particular function. Each function module of the monitoring systems works independently, having no data sharing with each other. So it is difficult to fully grasp the running state of hydroelectric generating units. This paper analyzed the technical characteristics of different condition monitoring technologies, and then drew a conclusion that virtual reality technology could better realize the hydroelectric generating units' condition monitoring. By adopting external I/O devices, the scheme realizes the data sharing of the whole system. Thus, it owns better performance than traditional hydroelectric generating units monitoring technologies, such as easier data dealing, better system friendliness and data sharing, lower failure rate, etc. The virtual reality technology can effectively solve the less comprehensive and poor predictive problems that traditional single equipment monitoring has. Regrettably, it still has a long way to go to accomplish the practical test of this technology.

Key words: hydroelectric generating units, condition monitoring, virtual reality technology, development tendency

Published in: Journal of China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research (Vol. 12 No. 3, 2014)