Your refinery has options when revamping Delayed Coker Units. This was recently realized for a customer of ours, one of the biggest refineries in the United States. They have two delayed coking units. DCU 1 which consist of a 4 drum coker and DCU 2, which consist of a 6 drum coker. All 10 drums currently were using our competitors level system for measurements.
Using our strong relationship with the refinery, we proudly introducted Berthold’s capabilities to the operators and instrument engineers. The customer has long experienced some issues with our competitors level system such as long-term drifting, temperature related problems and external radiation interference due to NDT testing. We were able to arrange a test at the site in which both VEGA and Berthold participated. This test was to show the customer both Berthold’s and VEGA’s ability to detect and minimize external radiation interference.
A Berthold LB480 2m rod detector was mounted on a piece of plywood alongside a VEGA 6-foot FT31 level detector. VEGA also had a MT31 point detector mounted for their external x-ray protection. Check sources were mounted in between the two detectors to simulate radiation from the mounted sources on a vessel. The customer had an NDT company positioned at various distances and performed some NDT test shots as it was recorded how each device detected, responded, and recovered from each NDT test shot. The test results clearly showed the customer that Berthold has far superior devices. Not only did this test show that the Berthold gauges are more sensitive but also better at detecting and minimizing errors due to NDT. The Berthold gauges had a 6.5 times higher count rate than the VEGA detectors as well as a more stable device. In all the NDT tests, Berthold detectors before and after cps deviated less than 1% (0.6% actual), whereas the VEGA device deviated by much larger amounts. This test proved to customer that Berthold has better detectors however VEGA continued bidding very aggressively on the project.
The extra sensitivity that the Berthold gauges have over the VEGA devices allows us to keep using the existing sources for more than 30 years, whereas VEGA was recommending the customer to replace the sources. In the end, the extra sensitivity of Berthold devices, the XIP function along with Berthold’s cosmic gain control allowed us to perform this test allowed Berthold to win both projects for revamping DCU1 and DCU2. Berthold won these projects despite the fact that VEGA is on the AVL and Berthold is not. We are currently working with the customer to place Berthold on their AVL. Word is starting to spread from one refinery to others about the test results. More details about the test and the results from this test will be presented in the future during a webinar.
Want to see the comparison? Watch now:
