| Although many companies claim to have a global presence, not many are capable of supplying emergency compressor dry gas seal repair service over a weekend during an international disease crisis. Yet, this was not a problem for John Crane – a leading supplier of engineered sealing systems and associated products – when it was asked to repair a dry gas seal at a customer’s refinery in Chile during the outbreak of the H1N1 (swine) flu.
On a Tuesday in June 2009, a major refinery in Chile contacted John Crane Chile S.A. about a compressor problem at its processing facility. Due to complications with the compressor, it had to be taken offline, and the seals needed repair. The compressor was vital to the plant‘s operation, and without the compressor the majority of the processing system had to be shutdown. In most cases, when a refinery goes down, the result can be a loss of a half-million dollars per day.
Although the plant usually has spare seals on hand, in this instance, the spare seals were out for repair at John Crane’s United States headquarters in Morton Grove, Ill. Repairing the remaining seal as soon as possible was crucial to getting the plant online. Plant personnel requested that a John Crane technician from the U.S. travel to Chile to repair the seals onsite, which would not have been a problem, except for the outbreak of the H1N1 flu. In June 2009, the World Health Organization (WHO) was reporting more than 100 countries stricken with the H1N1 flu, with most of the cases in the U.S., Mexico and Canada. Over 4,000 cases of the flu were reported in Chile, more than in any of its South American neighbors. Although “Chile is coping well with the epidemic,” according to Chilean President Michelle Bachelet, travel between the United States and Chile was curtailed.
Emergency Plan
To solve the customer’s problem, John Crane quickly went into action using its global service and support network to repair the seal. John Crane’s global resources allow it to react immediately to an emergency anywhere in the world where its seals and products are used. The company has been a presence in Chile for 23 years, and has more seals installed in Chile than all other mechanical seal suppliers combined.
“Because of our ability to react quickly in a global emergency,” said Joe Delrahim, Director, Dry Gas Seals for Latin America, “we were able to come up with a plan that used John Crane’s technical knowledge, industry expertise and web-based communication tools.” The plan involved engineers and sales representatives from John Crane’s Santiago, Chile office and engineers in the Morton Grove office.
“Even though we don’t have a dry gas seal repair facility in Chile, we were confident enough that with our local resources and the technical know-how of our people, we would be able to fix the seal at our regular John Crane facility in Chile,” Delrahim said. “If the seal was sent here, it would have taken two-to-three weeks to repair, including the time in transit. Since we couldn’t travel to Chile due to the flu restrictions, we had to repair the seals in Chile with guidance from our Morton Grove office.”
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 Tandem arrangement dry gas seals are commonly used in this type of refinery application. In this case, the customer was using Type 28 dry-running, non-contacting gas seals with patented spiral groove pattern. The mating ring/seat and primary ring/face maintain a sealing gap of about 0.002-in./5-microns, thereby eliminating wear. The tandem cartridge seals also eliminate seal oil contamination and reduce maintenance costs and downtime. The first seal operates as a primary seal, while the second seal functions as a back-up device. Process gas from the unit’s discharge line is piped to the control system supply line; the control system regulates and filters the buffer flow before it is injected into the primary seal. Leakage across the primary seal is piped to the flare. To ensure proper seal function, pressure and/or leakage flow rate are monitored and recorded.
The local team at the John Crane Chile facility disassembled the seals and discovered the internal components were covered with contaminants such as liquid condensate and heavy, gummy hydrocarbon residue. The visual inspection also found a few damaged elastomers, along with small, pitted carbon pull-out at the primary carbon sealing faces. A parts list and action items were prepared. The U.S. team pulled parts from inventory and began reconditioning the old components from the seal at the Morton Grove repair center.
Over the weekend, through a series of emails, phone calls and digital photos sent between Morton Grove and Santiago, Wilson Bernardo, Jr., Engineering Supervisor at John Crane Chile S.A., along with Jaime Cruz, Sales Supervisor, were able to rebuild the dry gas seal.
“After the seals were repaired, we drove them back to the refinery,” Bernardo said. “The refinery installed the first seal at 7 p.m. on Sunday, and the second seal at 4:30 a.m. on Monday. At 8:15 a.m. on Monday, they started the compressor. There have been no leakage problems; everything is working perfectly.”
Global Service, Local Support
According to Cruz, refinery personnel were extremely pleased with the outcome and offered their congratulations to John Crane’s team in Santiago and Morton Grove. “Compared with other shutdowns and start-ups that they have gone through, this was the best, they said,” Bernardo noted. “They were thrilled that the compressor started-up immediately with no seal leakage. They were delighted that John Crane took the extra effort to work with them in this emergency.”
To compete in today’s dynamic worldwide market, a company must be able to go the “extra mile” – and provide superior service wherever the customer is located. Because of John Crane’s extensive global resources and its commitment to customer service, they were able to react quickly to the refinery’s emergency and solve the problem.
“When faced with travel restrictions, John Crane’s engineers and technicians pooled their international resources, and got the refinery up-and-running in 24-hours,” Delrahim said. “We proved that in situations such as this, we were able to overcome all obstacles and get the job done. Although John Crane is a global company, we are local in our response to customer needs.”
For more information about this article or Type 28 seals, please contact me at mcosta@johncrane.com ; +55 11 3371 2503.
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