Palmer Technologies is a world leader in the design of refractory structures and patented technology (P-Lining®) has been proven to lower the risk of failure, increase lining life and improve plant reliability.
The design of static refractory structures has traditionally been based on empirical or trial and error methods and has evolved over the years. However, even today the design methodology is still very simplistic and is typically based on heat transfer analysis for material selection whilst the most common selection criteria for anchor material is based on published scaling temperatures of the anchor steel in an oxidization environment and 1D heat transfer analysis.
The failure of refractory structures in the cement, alumina, power, petroleum and petrochemical industries costs industry millions of dollars each year in downtime and repairs costs. There is no doubt that the design of refractory structures has posed significant engineering challenges and the practice of simply following what may have been done in the past, while important, cannot be considered an engineered design. The understanding of failure mechanisms and the availability of advanced engineering software means refractory structure design can be supported by engineering analysis.
After years of research the engineers at Palmer Technologies have developed an advanced refractory system based on proven engineering principles, P-Lining®. P-Lining is a patented refractory structure system. The simple but advanced engineered design has been in service at Cement Australia's Railton plant for >3 consecutive years. In early 2009 the plant won the company's excellence award for the project.
The Plant Shutdown Manager stated:
The advanced design system has been used by Ballance Agri-Nutrients (NZ), BP Refinery's (Brisbane), Incitec Pivot and Cement Australia.
It was determined that the P-Lining® refractory design system had materially improved the cost efficiency of maintenance, increased service life and plant reliability.
Replication of service life improvements across other vessels prone to high failure frequency is estimated to generate maintenance cost savings of $100,000 p.a. and at the same time deliver significant improvements in safety due to the new design.
