Dongfeng Honda Boosts Engine Production with SKF’s Real‑Time Spindle Monitoring

Honda’s sales in China surged more than 50 % year‑on‑year in 2009, and a second joint‑venture plant was slated for 2010. The company is eager to deliver more high‑quality, stylish models to the Chinese market.

Key to this success is the Dongfeng Honda engine plant, situated beside the assembly line in Guangzhou. The facility is equipped with state‑of‑the‑art machinery and produces 1.3‑ to 2.4‑liter engines for the Chinese market. At the heart of each production line is a multi‑function machining centre, the critical driver of productivity and quality.

These centres must run continuously under rapidly changing speeds and loads while machining engine blocks and heads. To keep the spindle within the tight tolerances required for Honda engines, bearing performance is essential. Early detection of bearing wear prevents spindle excursions, costly repairs, and prolonged production downtime.

Typically, a machining‑centre spindle’s bearings last one to two years before replacement. Determining the exact moment for a bearing swap is difficult, often requiring off‑line measurements that halt production and incur lost time.

Maintenance manager Chen Shi had been performing such offline checks for years, but the downtime was unacceptable. He sought an online solution that could monitor bearings 24/7, alerting staff at the first sign of wear or performance loss. No such system had yet been deployed at Honda China, so Chen turned to industry expertise.

At a maintenance conference he discovered SKF’s Multilog On‑Line System™ TMU, a combined condition‑monitoring and crash‑detection solution. The TMU continuously collects dynamic machine data from permanently installed sensors, evaluates it against user‑defined thresholds, and makes the information available for notification, analysis, and storage from any workstation in the plant.

After positive feedback, Chen invited SKF to propose a solution. A five‑month test and evaluation program followed, during which engineers examined:

1. Optimal vibration‑sensor placement on the spindle;
2. Cabling that supports reliable data transmission while allowing full spindle motion;
3. Accurate control points from Honda’s PLC for all machining operations;
4. The spindle’s vibration spectrum and trend across typical speeds and forces.

When the test concluded, Chen’s team—now fully trained on the TMU—enthusiastically installed the system on three machining centres. The results were immediate: one TMU flagged poor lubrication, allowing swift correction, while another detected a bearing defect that could be addressed during a scheduled maintenance stop. Since then, 19 additional TMUs have been installed at the Guangzhou engine plant, with three more ordered for the Wuhan facility.

“I’m very satisfied with the TMU’s performance and its ease of use for our maintenance staff,” Chen said. “Dongfeng Honda now knows that spindles won’t fail unexpectedly, protecting production and costs. We can also optimise availability by swapping bearings during planned stops.”

Features of the SKF Multilog On‑Line System™ TMU

The TMU is a three‑channel, 24‑hour surveillance device built to safeguard critical rotating assets in rugged manufacturing settings. It warns of developing issues such as bearing damage, spindle imbalance, and poor lubrication, and supplies diagnostic data to improve reliability and quality. The system also detects sudden shocks—like a spindle crash—and immediately shuts down the machine to prevent severe damage. Its distributed architecture allows easy expansion across small to large manufacturing systems.

For more information, visit the SKF website at www.skf.com.