Tag Archives: pipelines

After Assembly; The Rinsing of Pipes with Operating Fluid

The purging of hydraulic system pipes is vitally important to the proper operation of your hydraulic system equipment.  Purging the pipes ensures that the hydraulic system will have trouble free operation for the duration of its normal service life.  If the purge is not performed, or the duration of the process is not sufficient, premature wear of the internal components will be accelerated.  The system will most likely malfunction and/or fail entirely.  Problems may even occur immediately after being placed into service.

Our company, GlobeCore offers unique equipment that can purify turbine oil, industrial oil, transformer oil and other industrial oils.  Purity of the liquid after treatment in one of the GlobeCore UVR plants complies with and usually exceeds all existing standards.  The GlobeCore Process will help prevent hydraulic systems from failing prematurely and will greatly help to increase the service life of the treated equipment.
In accordance with industry standards, the following positive results can be achieved after purifying hydraulic equipment by removing solid particles, moisture, and other harmful contaminates from the hydraulic fluid:

  1. Double the lifetime of hydraulic motors, valves, pumps and distribution devices
  2. Hydraulic system warranties can be extended by as much as two years due to the reduction in the risk of hydraulic system component failure during the warranty period.  Fluid purity however, must still be monitored and controlled and the hydraulic system must be cleaned annually.
  3. Reduction of equipment downtime for repairs.
  4. Elimination of the cost of transportation of equipment to repair sites.
  5. Reduction of downtime costs.

It should be noted that the common concept that changing the oil and filters removes all moisture and contamination from the hydraulic equipment is simply not true.  Contamination remains in the motors, valves and on the internal surface of high pressure hoses.  Changing the oil is certainly an improvement, but it is an incomplete process that is costly, inefficient and will require repeating more frequently than a true purification process.

With slight modification of the filtration system and the use of special filter elements, equipment down time costs can be reduced significantly.

Recent studies and experience shows that no less than 70% of hydraulic failures occur due to the presence of solid particulate matter in the hydraulic fluid.  This failure rate is even more alarming considering that over 50% of all failures occur in the hydraulic drive system.  If equipment is allowed to operate with contaminated liquid, it will lead to intensive and premature wear of the hydraulic drive components, reduction of efficiency and increased internal energy losses.   The consequences are lost time and increased operating costs.

If Serial Filters are used in the hydraulic system, the concentration of solids in the fluid will be approximately 0.022% by weight.  This is 4.4 times above the acceptable standard.  Particles from 10 to 40 micron in size can constitute up to 50% of the contaminants in the fluid.  These sizes mostly coincide with the clearances between friction surfaces and are therefore, the most dangerous and cause the most wear.

As with serial filters, Main Line Filters also cannot provide the required level of hydraulic fluid purification needed to prevent system failures by themselves.   The hydraulic drive therefore, must be rinsed by special means or processes.

The main method of liquid purification in operating hydraulic equipment is regular purification of the hydraulic fluid by GlobeCore’s UVR plants.

It should be considered that purging of pipelines with special detergents is only sensible at the very first stages. At the time of system assembly and commissioning, the system should be purged with the hydraulic fluid, since using a detergent may lead to additional contamination of the system.