Air Cooler Replacement Project – Major Shutdown

LOCATION

Kwinana, Western Australia

INDUSTRY

Mining - Refining

VALUE

Up to $500k

Scope of Work

The Cooler was required by our client to replace an existing unit that had reached the end of it’s operational life. It involved the preparation of detailed drawings, procurement of materials, manufacture, testing and surface treatment of a finned-tube Air Cooler. The Cooler was 10m long x 3m wide and weighed 4 tonnes. The header boxes were 304 stainless steel and there was a total of 172 x 1” diameter stainless/aluminium finned tubes expanded into grooved holes.

Project Resourcing

The project team included:

Project Management
Quality Management
3D Scanning Engineer
Project Supervision
Boilermaking and Coded Welding Personnel

Fabrication

Fabrication of the Cooler was in accordance with AS1210 and welding was to AS3992. All welds were subject to 10% RT and PT inspection and the completed unit was hydrotested. The unit was mounted in a painted mild steel frame also fabricated by APMS for installation with the bundle.

Project Achievements

The project required APMS to maintain a close working relationship with our client throughout the fabrication process to ensure there were no delays in resolving technical issues and the completed unit was delivered on schedule to coincide with the shutdown window for change-out.

The Cooler fabrication was completed without accident or incident to the required technical and quality standards, on time and on budget. The unit was installed without incident and our client provided positive feedback on the quality of the end product and professionalism of our project team throughout the project.

Zero recordable incidents or accidents throughout the duration of the project.
Extensive interaction with our client to ensure timely resolution of numerous technical issues.
Achieved dimensional tolerances required to allow for a seamless changeout when connecting to existing pipework on site.

This project was delivered across a 7 month duration, with the sourcing of finned tubes to meet the project schedule being particularly challenging.

Key Activities

The success of the project was dependant on the successful execution of the following activities:

Preparation of Autocad drawings.
Material procurement.
Coded Tungsten Inert Gas (TIG) welding to AS3992.
3D scanning of header boxes to confirm inlet/outlet positions correspond with existing connecting pipework.
Mechanical expansion of tubes into grooved tubesheet holes.
Successful NDT (10% RT, PT and 100%visual inspection) and hydrotesting of the tube bundle.
100% material and weld traceability.
Coordination of multiple subcontractors including non-destructive testing (NDT), hydro testing, blasting & painting and logistics arrangements.
Liaise with the client to ensure Manufacturers Data Report (MDR) contained the information required for future reference including as built information and drawing updates.