Alberta, Canada has the world’s third largest oil reserves in the type of oil sands. Extracting and processing the oil from the sands and bedrock is a challenging process and requires the biggest slurry pump within the oil sands industry.
When it involves pumping slurry, there can be very few applications which would possibly be more difficult than the hydro-transport of heavy-duty slurries in oil sands production. Not only do the pumps should cope with the highly aggressive nature of the fluid being pumped, they are also expected to operate in some of the harshest environments in the world.
In January 2020, GIW Industries, Inc., a KSB company, commissioned its largest ever heavy-duty centrifugal slurry pump for operation in Canada’s oil sands, namely the Tie Bolt Construction (TBC-92). Named after its ninety two in (2337 mm) impeller, the TBC-92 is the largest and heaviest slurry pump out there in the oil sands industry and the newest in a line of powerful high-pressure pumps provided by GIW.
Slurry transportation Slurry transport covers a substantial vary of industry sectors, starting from meals and beverage to mining. What is frequent to all, is that the pumps used must have the power to transport liquids containing particles and solids of various sizes and viscosities. In mining, dredging and oil sands production, the biggest challenge is to accommodate high density slurry and extremely abrasive grits.
It is important that the slurry passes via the pump with the minimal amount of wear and tear to the pump casing, impeller, shaft and sealing mechanism. Furthermore, the pump must be able to delivering excessive flows and able to face up to harsh working environments.
Alberta in Canada has extensive oil reserves and these are in the type of oil sands. Extracting and processing the oil from the sands and bedrock is difficult, involving the removing of bituminous ore which is transported to a crushing plant. The crushed ore is then combined with heat water to type a dense slurry that could be transported in the pipeline towards extraction, where the bitumen is separated from the sand and rock. After extraction, the remaining solids (or tailings) are sometimes transported via different pumps to settling ponds.
The processes require in depth use of slurry and water transportation pumps able to dealing with vast portions of liquids at excessive pressures and excessive temp- eratures. Drawing on its lengthy experience of designing slurry pumps for mining, GIW has custom-engineered slurry pumps that mix superior supplies, hydraulics and patented mechanical designs, the newest of which is the TBC-92.
เกจวัดแรงดันแก๊สlpg challenges Mollie Timmerman, GIW business growth manager, explains extra: “Our consumer needed a better capacity pump which was capable of 10,000–11,000 m3 per hour of output at almost 40 m of developed head and a maximum working stress of 4000 kPa. The pump additionally needed to have the flexibility to move rocks of roughly 130 mm in diameter with a total passage dimension requirement of 10 in (or 254 mm) and deal with slurry densities in extra of 1.5 SG.
In addition, the client was targeting a upkeep interval (operational time between deliberate maintenance) of round 3,000 hours. They had expressed an curiosity in maximising the maintenance intervals and based on preliminary wear indications, they are currently hoping to attain around 6,000 hours between pump overhauls (i.e. 6–8 months).”
The immediate utility for the first batch of GIW’s TBC-92 pumps in Alberta is in hydro-transport service the place they are used to move bitu- minous ore from the crusher to the extraction plant. The liquid pumped is a combination of water, bitumen, sand, and huge rocks. Screens are in place to maintain these rocks to a manageable dimension for the method, however the high dimension can nonetheless usually reach as much as one hundred thirty mm in diameter or larger.
The abrasive nature of the slurry is what separates a slurry pump from other pumps used in the industry. Wear and erosion are details of life, and GIW has many years of experience within the design of slurry pumps and the development of supplies to help prolong the service life of these critical parts to match the planned maintenance cycles in the plant.
“GIW already had a pump able to the output requirement, this being the MDX-750, which has been a popular dimension in mill duties for nearly 10 years through- out Central and South America,” explains Mollie Timmerman. ”However, the customer’s application required a pump with greater pressure capabilities and the potential of handling larger rocks so we responded with the development of the TBC-92 which provided the most effective resolution for maximised manufacturing.”
The TBC sequence The construction type of GIW’s TBC pump range options massive, ribbed plates held along with tie bolts for very high-pressure service and most wear performance. First developed for dredge service, then later launched into the oil sands in the 1990s, the TBC pump series has grown into a totally developed vary of pumps serving the oil sands, phosphate, dredging and hard rock mining industries for tailings and hydrotransport applications.
The pumps are sometimes grouped together in booster stations to construct pressure as high as 750 psi (5171 kPa) to account for the pipe losses encountered over such long distances. The strong development of the TBC pump is properly suited to do the job, whereas ensuring maximum availability of the tools beneath heavily abrasive wear.
Capable of delivering pressure as much as 37 bar and flows of more than 18,200m³/h and temperatures as a lot as 120o C, the TBC range is a horizontal, end suction centrifugal pump that provides most resistance to wear. Simple to keep up, the pump’s tie-bolt design transfers stress loads away from the wear resistant white iron casing to the non- bearing aspect plates with out the utilization of heavy and unwieldy double-wall development.
The TBC-92 combines one of the best parts of earlier TBC models, including the TBC-84 oil sands tailing pump, also referred to as the Super Pump. The pump also incorporates features from GIW’s MDX product line, which is utilized in heavy-duty mining circuits throughout the world of onerous rock mining.
In whole, the TBC-92 weighs about 209,000 lbs (95,000 kg), which is roughly equivalent to a fully-loaded Airbus A321 aeroplane. The casing alone weighs 34,000 lbs (15,500 kg). Key options of the pump embrace a slurry diverter that dramatically increases suction liner life by lowering particle recirculation between the impeller and the liner. The massive diameter impeller allows the pump to run at slower speeds so that wear life is enhanced. The decrease velocity additionally provides the pump the ability to function over a wider vary of flows in order to accommodate fluctuating circulate situations.
To make maintenance simpler, the pump is fitted with a special two-piece suction plate design which helps to scale back device time and provide safer lifting. Customers obtain pump-specific lifting units to facilitate the secure elimination and installation of put on and tear comp- onents. The pump additionally includes a longlasting suction liner that can be adjusted without needing to shut the pump down.
New milestone The commissioning of the TBC-92 marks an necessary milestone for GIW, which now has pumps in service in any respect working Canadian oil sands crops for hydrotransport purposes. The TBC-92 has been designed to sort out heavy-duty slurry transport while offering a low whole value of ownership. Minimal labour and maintenance time assist to maximise manufacturing and revenue.
“This new pump incorporates the teachings discovered from operating within the oil sands over a few years, and features our newest hydraulic and put on technologies,” says Mollie Timmerman. “Because this is the heaviest TBC pump we now have ever designed, particular consideration was given to maintainability, as properly as materials selection and development of the pressure-containing components.”
That GIW has established itself as a major pressure in pumping solutions for the oil sands business is much from shocking provided that it has been developing pumping applied sciences and put on resistant materials within the international mining business for the rationale that 1940s.
These pumps have had a considerable impression on the way that excavated sand, rock and bitumen are transported to the upgrader plant. By including water to the excavated material it turns into extremely environment friendly to pump the slurry alongside a pipeline to the upgrader. The pipeline agitation assists in separating the bitumen from the sand as it’s transported, plus there might be the extra advantage of eradicating the use of vans.
GIW has estimated that the worth of shifting oil sand on this means can reduce prices by US$2 a barrel, and it’s far more environmentally pleasant. These pumps additionally play a major function in transporting the coarse tailings to the tailings ponds. GIW supplies pumps used within the extraction course of and other areas of manufacturing (HVF, MDX, LSA).
Understanding slurries Understanding the nature of slurries and the way they behave when being pumped has been basic to the event of those merchandise. GIW has been obtaining slurry samples from prospects over a few years for testing hydraulics and supplies each for pumps and pipelines. Research & Development facilities embrace a quantity of slurry check beds on the campus, along with a hydraulics laboratory that’s devoted to pump efficiency testing.
These activities are central to the company’s pump improvement programmes. If corporations are experiencing problems the GIW R&D personnel can see where the issue lies and supply advice for remedial motion. Experience does point out that in many cases the issue lies not with the pump nevertheless, however within the interplay between the pipeline and the pump.
Feedback from clients about appli- cations helps in the improvement of latest instruments and pump designs. By bringing to- gether customers and teachers from all over the world to share their experience and analysis with in-house specialists, the huge investment in research, growth and manufacturing has superior the design of all of the GIW pump merchandise,materials and wear-resistant components.
The future “There is a clear development toward bigger pumps in mining and dredging and oil sands are not any exception,” feedback Leo Perry, GIW lead product supervisor. “The first TBC pump in the oil sands industry was the TBC-46 (46 in being the diameter of the impeller). Customers are designing their amenities for larger and higher production and demanding the same of the equipment that retains their production shifting. While these bigger pumps demand extra power, additionally they allow for higher manufacturing with less downtime required for upkeep. Overall, the effectivity improves when compared to the same output from a bigger amount of smaller pumps. “
In conclusion, he says: “Larger pumps go hand-in-hand with bigger facilities, bigger pipelines, and elevated manufacturing, all of which continue to development greater 12 months after yr. Other customers and industries have also shown an curiosity in this size, and it would be no shock at all to see extra of these pumps constructed in the close to future for similar applications.”
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