RCS offers a wide range of solutions to corrosion problems in a variety of industries, including oil and gas, petrochemical, water treatment, chemical, pulp, paper & pharmaceutical.
Quicksand™ erosion detection system
Quicksand™ Erosion Detection System Sand production in oil and gas producing wells can cause rapid erosion and wear of top side equipment such as chokes, valves, and flow-lines. In addition, it may cause serious formation damage. Rapid detection and remediation of sand producing/erosion episodes is necessary to prevent short-term failure of topside equipment, and cumulative formation damage.
RCS offers a range of metal loss sensors and instrumentation, designed specifically to detect sand erosion at speeds approaching real time.
Sensing elements for the Quicksand™ erosion measurement system can be made from almost any commercially available alloy. Less corrosion resistant materials — such as carbon steel — will show the combined effects of corrosion, and erosion whereas more resistant alloys — such as duplex stainless steel or Hastelloy — will show erosion effects exclusively.
Quicksand™ probes and instrumentation can be fully integrated with other digital loop transmitters manufactured by RCS, such as Linear Polarization (Corrater®), or high resolution electrical resistance (Microcor®), to provide a comprehensive corrosion/erosion monitoring solution within a single digital communication and data handling system.
The areas experiencing the most severe effects of erosion are the outer diameters of bends and areas downstream of changes in pipeline diameter. However, the Quicksand™ probe is best placed with its sensing element at the center of the line in a straight run pipe section where the greatest flow rates are experienced, since this is the place where the highest concentrations of sand are typically found.
A typical Quicksand™ system consists of a series of probes coupled to transmitters.
Probe
- Model S4500 is a rugged, all welded cylindrical element with a specially designed element support shield, suitable for severe flow or high temperature applications
- Model S4700 is an angled element probe which is exposed to the flow at a 45° angle, simulating a change in direction in the pipe (the maximum temperature of this probe is 400°F, and is recommended for less severe flow rates of less than 25 ft/sec)
Although both of these probes are mounted in the Cosasco line of high pressure access fittings, alternative mounting methods are also available.
Transmitter
The ST9485 erosion transmitter is mounted directly on the probe, using the appropriate probe adapter. Connection to the monitoring system is made using an industry standard RS-485 multi-drop connection.
This line may be attached to a number of ST9485 erosion transmitters, M9485 Microcor® corrosion transmitters, and E9020 Corrater® transmitters. Alternatively, each transmitter may be attached to a M9500 data logger.