Intelligent pump cleaning cuts maintenance at Irish plant 28 May 2010

Installation of an ac drive with automatic de-ragging software has slashed maintenance call-outs to deal with pump impeller fouling at an Irish County Council pumping station.

Fingal County Council's mechanical supervisor Jim McGuiness explains that Control Techniques' IPC Lite software was fitted to a replacement Commander SK ac drive at a pumping station at Kelly's Bay, Skerries, and cut callouts from weekly to just once since it was installed six months ago.

"The pumping station would run for a couple of weeks and then we'd get three or four call-outs in a week," comments McGuiness. "So, when it was time to replace one of the existing 15kW ac drives, Control Techniques' Drive Centre in Newbridge suggested that we had IPC Lite software loaded," he continues.

"It has worked extremely well. Before the software, we switched between the two pumps weekly to spread the load from a maintenance point of view. However, since August we have just run the one pump with the IPC Lite software and monitored its performance by telemetry. Maintenance costs have dramatically reduced."

McGuiness also explains that, before the installation, call-outs for blockages to Kelly's Bay, a distance of some 11 miles, took a team of two an average of two hours each time – a significant maintenance burden.

The pump now runs around the clock, with flow rates varying between 20 and 70m3/hr. The de-ragging software provides early warnings and initiates cleaning routines automatically by measuring on-board active current (not just motor's nominal current, which can lead to errors of 30—40% of torque) every millisecond to detect torque trends.

"We are very pleased with the IPC system and it has completely proved itself since its installation," comments senior electrical and mechanical engineer John Williams. "After checking our telemetry data over 12 months, it is clear that it has significantly reduced our maintenance costs.

"We are now looking at fitting IPC to the second riser, and other problematic pumping stations are also under consideration. It is clearly cost-effective and is a low cost solution compared with costly macerators."

Brian Tinham

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