Patent ID: 8527214

Claim:
A method of monitoring a mechanical seal, which provides a seal between a rotating machine part and another machine part, to determine whether at least one seal face of said mechanical seal is worn, said method including the steps of: (a) providing at least one wear probe operably associated with at least one rotating component of said mechanical seal, said at least one wear probe being movable relative to said at least one rotating component, said at least one wear probe being configured to move relative to said at least one seal face independent of any wear of said at least one seal face, said at least one wear probe being configured to cause stress waves to be induced only when said at least one wear probe is in contact with said at least one rotating component; (b) providing at least one stress-wave sensor for measuring the intensity of stress waves induced by said at least one wear probe when it contacts said at least one rotating component; (c) moving said at least one wear probe relative to said at least one rotating component so that the distance between said at least one wear probe and said at least one rotating component decreases; (d) measuring a stress-wave signal with said at least one stress-wave sensor at any time during or subsequent to step (c); and, (e) evaluating the stress-wave signal measured in step (d) to determine if said mechanical seal is worn.