Abstract A crack in the tooth root is the least desirable damage caused to gear units and often leads to failure of gear unit operation. A possible damage in gear units can be identified by monitoring vibrations. In relation to that, different methods of time signals analysis are presented. Signals have been obtained by experiments. Significant changes in tooth stiffness are the result of a fatigue crack in a tooth root. As a consequence, dynamic response differs from the one in concern to an undamaged tooth. Amplitudes of time signal are, by frequency analysis, presented as a function of frequencies in spectrum with time frequency analysis.