Balancing using your mobile phone

Inbalance is one of the most common causes of high vibration in machines. If the largest vibration component in the spectra is at 1X (i.e. at the frequency corresponding to rotation speed) then unbalance is the likely cause. Balancing is therefore a regular maintenance activity in many workplaces. Ray Beebe explains a method that has been successfully used on rotors large and small, with the only instrumentation required for balancing being the stopwatch feature of a mobile phone.