Feature separation using ICA for a one-dimensional time series and its application in fault detection

Principal component analysis (PCA) is a method that transforms multiple data series into uncorrelated data series. Independent component analysis (ICA) is a method that separates multiple data series into independent data series. Both methods have been used in fault detection. However, both require signals from at least two separate sensors. To overcome this requirement and utilize the fault detection capability of ICA and PCA, we propose to use wavelet transform to pre-process the data collected from a single sensor and then use the coefficients of the wavelet transforms at different scales as input to ICA and PCA. The effectiveness of this method is demonstrated by applying it to both a simulated signal series and a vibration signal series collected from a gearbox. The results show that the method of combining wavelet transform and ICA works better than the method of combining wavelet transform and PCA for impulse detection based on a one-dimensional vibration data series.