What is an Anderon Meter?

The Anderon meter measures the vibration of a rotating bearing in units called Anderons. This instrument lets you evaluate general bearing quality.

The Anderon value provides general information on the quality of the main parts of the bearing, including shape (waviness) and surface smoothness of the inner race, outer race, and rolling elements (balls). You can connect a headphone or oscilloscope to the Anderon meter to identify scratches, dust in grease, and other defects in various parts, including the retainer and sealer, simply by monitoring sounds or observing output waveforms.

If the inner race has a scratch, you'll see a spike at a regular frequency in the waveform.
If the outer race has a scratch, you'll see a spike waveform corresponding to the location of the equipped outer race. Scratches on bearing balls result in spikes of varying wave heights. Grease contaminated by dust will typically show up as an irregular spike waveform.

You can use the Anderon meter to detect scratches and dust or the presence of bearing balls of differing diameters or missing bearing balls.
The meter also lets you identify problems in component parts by comparing the vibration component determined from bearing specifications against the spectrum of a measured waveform.