Instantaneous Frequency Estimation Method for the Vibration Signal of Rotating Machinery Based on STFTSC Algorithm

In this paper, an instantaneous frequency identification method known as STFTSC is developed by combining short-time Fourier transformation and the seam carving (SC) algorithm (widely used in image processing). In this method, the STFT is applied to analyze the time-frequency energy distribution of a vibration signal under variable-speed conditions. Subsequently, the energy gradient is calculated through the Sobel operator based on the time-frequency energy distribution. The energy gradient distribution contains multiple ridges, which are corresponding instantaneous frequencies of different orders. Finally, the targeted ridge extraction is transformed into an optimization problem, and the dynamic programming algorithm (DP) is used to search the targeted ridge with the minimum energy gradient to estimate the instantaneous frequency. The effectiveness of the proposed method is validated by a simulation experiment, moreover, a rotating machinery fault simulation test bench is employed to validate the method, which is then compared with polynomial chirplet transformation (PCT) and analyzed during the test process. The results show that the STFTSC instantaneous frequency estimation algorithm has a higher extraction accuracy and better application value in engineering problems than the PCT.