Supply fault fixed in a day
A
Furmanite International product story
Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team
Dec 6, 2005
Furmanite fixed a fault at a main supply grid station within 24 hours, ensuring uninterrupted electricity supply; a similar fault had previously taken several weeks to rectify.
A rapid response from Furmanite enabled a fault at a main supply grid station to be repaired within 24 hours, ensuring uninterrupted electricity supply; a similar fault had previously taken several weeks to rectify.
Switchgear on a 33kV busbar chamber at a Scottish Power Grid substation north of Glasgow had been damaged when the chamber casting (made from aluminium alloy and filled with hot bitumen compound) suffered severe distortion following an internal flashover.
Two 7.5 to 10.2cm vertical cracks and a 0.6cm hole in the casing resulted.
While depending on the alternative busbar system, a failure would have left up to 40,000 customers at risk of losing their electricity supply.
Furmanite carried out an on-site assessment of the damage and operating conditions to select the most suitable method and materials for an in-situ repair.
The cracks were contaminated with bitumen, so a welded repair had been ruled out in favour of an epoxy putty repair, designed to accommodate the operating requirements for the chamber which is filled with hot bitumen compound at around 140C.
Furmanite technicians on-site did the repair within 24 hours, the day after the order was received.
The surface of the casing was prepared using aluminium desoutter and roughing tools, working carefully directly on and around the defects.
Fast-curing epoxy putties were applied, combined with reinforcing layers for extra structural strength.
This sealed both the cracks and the hole, with a design life of some 10 years.
Scottish Power Power Systems Senior Project Engineer Ken Hamilton said: "This fault was very similar to one that occurred at another site nearly four years ago".
"Then the repair required us to carry out continuous 24-hour working to dismantle the fractured casting"." This was transported to Manchester where a specialist welding company completed a repair".
"The casting was returned to site and reassembled before refilling three chambers with three-quarters of a tonne of hot bitumen compound".
"It was a very big job and took many weeks to complete before the network was finally restored to normal".
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