By Noam Amir Feature Comprehensive inspection and maintenance of pipes and tubes are critical to keeping modern manufacturing facilities working at top capacity. Most manufacturing facilities today contain thousands of tubes and pipes as the backbone of their fabrication processes. The tubes and pipes extract, generate, and deliver the required energy content that enables the facilities to be productive, efficient, and profitable. Of these, heat exchangers are one of the most common workhorses in many industries. It is, therefore, imperative that these perform at their utmost 24 Inspection Trends / January 2011 capacity, which requires regular, comprehensive inspection and maintenance. Traditionally, a process known as sampling has been used for heat exchanger tube inspection. This involves testing a percentage of tubes (typically 8–10%) as a gauge of the entire system. Sampling, however, brings a significant amount of risk when making major decisions regarding the integrity of these critical systems. The conventional nondestructive examination (NDE) methods that have historically been used for heat exchanger inspection can be invasive, slow, and cumbersome. Additionally, these methods are limited by tube configuration, size, and material, making it difficult for full inspections to be carried out. As a result, it isn’t surprising that the practice of sampling has become the typical equipment owner’s inspection alternative. As new Inspecting Tubing with Sound An acoustic-based technology offers an option for 100% inspection of heat exchangers and other tube applications
Inspection Trends - January 2011 - Winter
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