Supplying a Range of Process Equipment to Help Our Customer Succeed
Our customer is a paint manufacturer in the automotive supply chain. When they built their new plant in Tennessee, Cross Process Solutions specified and supplied many of the valves, instrumentation, tank vents, safety relief valves and blanket gas regulators for the facility.
They have been in production for over a year and recently contacted Cross to inspect their tank vents to make sure they are operating correctly. They also asked for help developing a preventive maintenance and inspection plan for them. Cross has an inspection procedure for this type of equipment and we were asked to visually inspect in place and verify they should operate as intended.
We brought two teams to their plant and, working together with their operations team, were able to inspect 30 tanks with two vents each, for a total of 60 vents, in two days. The majority of the valves were operating as intended, although we did find:
- Several, with holes worn in the diaphragms. We replaced the soft goods and reassembled.
- We also found one vent which had chattered so badly that the stem nut had come off, which allowed the retaining plate to block the relief path. This was also repaired and reassembled.
In addition, for all equipment, an in-field inspection traveller was filled out to document what we found. We also tagged and resealed the vent.
The operations team was very impressed that Cross could complete the work in only two days. Because only the defective vents had to be removed, the in-field inspection saved a great deal of time and expense versus shutting the tanks down and sending the valves into a repair center. However, every two to three years, Cross does recommend a full inspection and testing on a certified test stand. We also recommended that our customer purchase spare valves which can be rotated in when the full testing is being performed.
With the beginning of their preventative maintenance schedule in place, the customer is better able to predict which tank vents may need to be fully serviced sooner than others, with the documentation to support the plan.
