How Field Engineers Solve Sampling System Challenges
Sampling system performance can have a significant impact on product quality, process efficiency, and operating costs. Swagelok’s global network of field engineers brings extensive experience in diagnosing and solving sampling system challenges across a wide range of industries. From the process tap to the analyzer, our specialists conduct comprehensive system evaluations to identify inefficiencies, improve sample integrity, and optimize performance. Learn how Swagelok can help you achieve more reliable analysis, faster response times, and better overall process control through expert sampling system support
Video Transcript
We look at anything from the tap on the analyzer in an analytical instrumentation system, right from the field station and field conditions to the fast loop sample conditioning, all the way up to the analyzer.
And it’s usually the sample systems that feed the analyzer that cause most of the problems, to the tune of about 80% or more. So, the analyzer is not really the problem; it’s the sample system that is the problem. The niche that we are in is exactly where the pain seems to occur for the customer.
So, at a recent evaluation and advisory service at an oil refinery in our territory, we had a system that was experiencing a four- to five-hour time delay. What that means is that when a customer made a process change, the analyzer didn’t see the change for four to five hours.
As you can imagine, in that four to five hours, a lot of product had made it past that analyzer. So, if they were to find a bad result at the analyzer, they would have to either rework the product or scrap the product. That’s a huge cost loss for our customer.
By taking the whole system view and solving the issue of the time delay, we took it from four to five hours to four to five minutes. The customer estimates that they will save about $1 million per year. Obviously, that’s a big return for our customer, and having that instant feedback, that four- to five-minute feedback from the analyzer, allows them to control their process much more tightly and, at the end of the day, save about $1 million per year.
So, we were engaged with one of the biggest petrochemical facilities in the Middle East. We were working with them on a process line into the lab, and when we reached the lab, we found a lot of problems inside the lab.
We’ve been working with them to provide a very simple, small assembly to solve all the leak problems they were having in the lab, and it has been standardized across the 15 labs they have in the region. It certainly saves a lot of time, it’s very easy to maintain, and we built a good relationship with them.
We would go out onto the site of a refinery, look at their grab sample stations, and if there are stations that are not working, meaning they’re not getting clean samples, they’re not getting samples they can use in the lab, or the panels aren’t working, we would make recommendations and do a redesign based on our expertise and knowledge. Then, we would actually build those panels and provide them. So, it would be a complete solution, right from the findings to the delivery.
We’re moving now toward systems that are much, much simpler and easier to understand, easier to integrate into, and easier to retrofit onto an existing system.
So, it’s a really exciting time, and I think some of those things are going to be very impactful on our lives in the future, on customers, and on the way things are done on analyzer systems in our process plants.
