Product category:
Welding, cutting and adhesive bonding
News Release from: Arc Energy Resources | Subject: Twin-wire cladding
Edited by the Processingtalk Editorial
Team on 13 March 2006
Faster weld overlay cladding using twin
wires
Arc Energy R and D announces the development of a new twin-wire system for its weld overlay cladding (WOC) processes, doubling the deposition rate and enhancing dilution figures
The recently created Arc Energy R and D department has announced its first innovation with the development of a new twin-wire system for its weld overlay cladding (WOC) processes The twin-wire system introduces a second consumable wire into the welding process, immediately doubling the deposition rate
This article was originally published on Processingtalk on 15 Apr 2004 at 8.00am (UK)
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It has also proved to enhance dilution figures, as the increase in wire acts as an additional heat sink within the weld pool, giving quicker solidification times and thus reducing the heat affected zone.
Parameters are carefully controlled to ensure that good fusion is maintained while keeping the pool as small as possible.
Commenting for Arc Energy, QA and Welding Engineering Manager Peter Minett says: "For companies specialising in WOC, reducing production time is an obvious advantage to customers.
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Needless to say, the biggest influence on cladding production time is the rate at which the material can be deposited".
Putting quantities and deposition rates into perspective, Peter explains that a 2.8m-long vessel with a diameter of 950mm being clad with a 4mm thickness of material, will take almost 300kg of alloy.
The conventional GTAW process would deposit the alloy at a rate of just over one kilo per hour.
The new twin-wire system almost doubles this deposition rate, providing obvious savings in production time.
Having qualified the weld procedures in accordance with ASME IX, the twin-wire process has been successfully used to clad the total outer surface of a 72'' diameter valve ball.
The fact that the twin-wire process is suitable for vertical and horizontal deposition also meant that the valve ball didn't need to be moved continually to allow for its shape.
This contributed to the significant reduction in timescale as the surface could be clad in just two settings.
As with many applications in the oil and gas industry, delivery of the valve ball was critical.
Using the standard GTAW process to clad the valve ball would have taken up to four weeks to complete but, by using the new twin-wire process, Arc Energy was able to reduce this to just over two weeks.
Summing up, Peter Minett says weld overlay cladding remains the most versatile form of heavy-duty metallic protection against corrosion, not only in oil and gas but in other industries that experience long term degradation of fluid carrying systems.
Now, with the development of the Arc Energy twin-wire system, it is also able to meet the demand for faster turn-round on vital pipeline equipment such as valves, fittings and associated components.
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