Facing a challenging brief, Elta Fans has designed and manufactured four custom explosion-proof fans for use on an offshore oil and gas application in Brazil.
Needing to follow the customer and end-user’s pre-defined specification, in addition to a small installation footprint, Elta Fans’ Applied Technology engineers built four bespoke fans at its Fareham-based factory. The 1,120mm diameter, stainless-steel long cased axial units utilised marine-grade aluminium impellers, stainless-steel 316L casings, terminal boxes, and ancillaries to withstand the harsh offshore salt-laden environment.
Along with being durable, a key requirement was making sure the fans were explosion-proof and complied with the customer’s design requirements, in addition to offshore and Brazilian safety regulations. As such, the fans were built with C5M-painted Zone 1 ATEX motors, BFOU cabling, and stainless-steel glands. To comply with the Brazilian standard NR-37, motor cowls, access doors, and internal terminal boxes were painted to colour RAL 2008.
For the end-user’s monitoring requirements, the fan models came equipped with Shock Pulse Monitoring (SPM) sensors and a cable transit system to wire the coaxial cable to an externally fan mounted terminal box. Accounting for vibration during installation, the fan mounting plate was paired with anti-vibration mounts.
Leading on the project, Lewis Brand, Technical & Project Sales Engineer at Elta Fans, said:
“Working on applied technology projects means working through customer specifications to ensure we’re designing the best fan for their application, and working with customers throughout a project is something we pride ourselves on at Elta Fans. This project really showcases our engineering capability; four unique fans that we have manufactured to the highest quality and will stand the test of time.”
For more about Elta Fans Applied Technology division, please visit https://eltafans.com/divisions/applied-technology/
