CASES & ENCLOSURES FEATURE
weathering and hydrolysis loads. It is also more resistant to UV than plastic materials, such as the acrylic paints used by many metal cabinet manufacturers. The gel-coat is applied as a 500 micrometre thick layer. In contrast, the acrylic finishes of steel cabinets are often only around 70-80 micrometres. The only degradation that occurs
with such a gel-coat surface layer is very slight thinning over time due to UV radiation – which has been measured at about 100 micrometres over periods of 30 years – and which has no overall effect on the housing’s structural integrity, stability or function. Extremely hostile conditions
combining high UV with abrasive sand or dust storms can slightly increase gel- coat loss rate, but again there is no fundamental change in the performance of the underlying enclosure. The combined contributions of resistance to UV, corrosion and chemicals means that GRP field enclosures offer ultra-long and maintenance free lifecycles.
OFF THE GRID The problems of producing solutions for remote locations are often exacerbated by the lack of a reliable electricity supply. For instance, in the case of SCADA instrumentation for a desert pipeline, which requires cooling, the threat of dust and sand storms can create reliability problems for conventional active HVAC employing fans. Power consumption will
Turnkey design and building services are helping operators overcome the challenges of limited engineering resources
also typically need to be minimised to reduce the scale (and cost) of local power generation from solar cells, wind, generators etc. Employing passive cooling technology has been an answer for many of these systems, but this tends to work well only in arid climates with large daily temperature swings. There are now novel additions to passive cooling systems which allow passive cooling to be used in many different climate conditions - even equatorial regions. Intertec employs two main techniques, for example. One is the use of micro pumps - which can be powered by small solar panels - to improve the circulation of the cooling media. The second is the augmentation of the performance of the cooling media - which is typically water - by means of cooler or chilled water. Again, at the heart of such solutions are enclosures with advanced insulation efficiency.
SKILLS AND KNOW-HOW Finally, one of the most intractable problems facing many plant and processing organisations is not related to protection performance, but the scarcity of skilled engineers. In Intertec’s case, the response to this general problem has been to offer factory-based system building services. This portion of the company’s overall business has more than doubled in size and over half the enclosures shipped are now in the form of turnkey instrumentation systems. The major reason behind this trend is very interesting. Processing companies have outsourced a lot of their engineering needs to project companies. In addition to improving the 'bottom line’, an
underlying reason - at least in the western world - is the ageing population of engineering talent. Many western engineers have reached retirement age and it has been difficult to find suitable replacements - reinforcing decisions to outsource. And in the UK, at least, that talent pool is shrinking. Sir James Dyson recently noted that “we’re suicidally under-producing engineers” when he established the new Dyson School of Design Engineering. When looking at emerging economies
- particularly BRIC countries - their engineers tend to be very young and have relatively short experience. There are so many opportunities that they frequently ‘job hop’ as well. On an increasing number of requests for quotation that Intertec sees, it is clear that many engineers have only a limited understanding of the standards involved, and the bigger picture. Of course, this is a double-whammy
in many cases as it is coinciding with a growing need for more complex protection. One of the key responses that Intertec has made has been an evolution of its turnkey instrumentation design and building services to encompass the most large scale instrumentation projects. Examples include shipping complete and tested skid-mounted systems, fully- equipped analyser shelters, and perhaps the most complex projects of all, remote instrumentation enclosures which are being used to decentralise control and instrumentation equipment into the field, close to the process.
Intertec
www.intertec.info
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