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What is a normal leakage rate?
How long does it take to survey a plant?
What leakage rate is possible to achieve?
Is it economical to try to achieve a level below 5%?
What do you think is the minimum accepted level of leakages?
Why don’t we just do leakage detection ourselves?
Is it a good idea to just do the worst?
What is a normal leakage rate?
Most surveys show a leakage rate of between 20-30% of the produced air. We have examples of up to 70% leakages but very seldom below 10%. In facilities where the compressors run continuously people forget that leakages also leak continuously. In fact it will often leak more during non production hours as the pressure in the system is then generally higher.
How long does it take to survey a plant?
LeekSeek™ will on average cover 7,000 m2 (75,000 sqft) of production area per day but that also includes documentation time. This is a general rule of thumb and is applicable on 80 % of most production facilities.
The time consuming factor is the documentation and recording of the parts that need to be either repaired or replaced. It is worth taking that time as it will greatly improve the logistics of the repair process. With more than 3000 projects behind us your local LeekSeek™ representative will be able to give you a very accurate estimate on the days required to survey your plant based on plants similar to yours.
What leakage rate is possible to achieve?
Below 5 % is a common result if the program is followed correctly. Some companies have become virtually leak free. Leakages re-appear relatively quickly through normal wear of equipment so an absolute leak free system is not realistic. It is interesting to compare the leakage rate of a compressed air system with a water or hydraulic system which is generally much lower. The reason of course is that the leakages become visible and leave a mess but it actually gives an indication as to what is possible. Who could live with a 20-30 % leakage rate of the hydraulic system? Due to the severe implications a leaking hydraulic system more money is spent on the quality of hose and couplings and a greater effort taken to eliminate leakages completely. Using the same philosophy on your compressed air system will provide significant improvements to the system. Using better couplings, material and methods may cost somewhat more but the savings make it easily justified.
Is it economical to try to achieve a level below 5%?
It really depends on the volume of air produced. For a paper mill a 5 % leakage rate could very well represent a significant volume and cost that would be economically justifiable to improve on. For a very small user a 10 % leakage rate may not warrant further improvements.
What do you think is the minimum accepted level of leakages?
The simplistic view on this is that if you have € 5000 in leakages which is equivalent 0,5 cbm per minute in leakages then you have € 5000 to spend to fix them. Some companies look at return on investment but others simply view leakages as a waste and a cost that needs to be eliminated and will accept that the required actions are cost neutral. The reality is that the minimum acceptable level of leakages is much lower than one would expect. The reason is simply that compressed air is so expensive that it is almost always cost effective to repair them. We recommend that you keep in mind that one 1 mm leakage is equivalent of € 700 so finding just a few will justify a survey and repair.
Why don’t we just do leakage detection ourselves?
There is a short and a long answer to this question. The short answer is that it is not economical. If you included the cost of buying the ultra sonic equipment, the time it takes to learn how to use it, to set up a system for documentation, include your labour cost and the logistics of repairing the leakages then you will have exceeded the cost of a survey from an external source. In addition you have to take the following question into consideration, will you find as many leakages as a specialist? The problem with doing this yourself is that the margin for error is extremely small. Missing just a few leakages is the equivalent of the whole cost of the survey. LeekSeek™ technicians do nothing else but leakage detection and have years of experience on where to find leakages, how the ultra-sound equipment works and will survey a plant very quickly and efficiently. If they find as little as 3-4 more leakages than you would yourself, then the cost of the survey is easily justified. You would also have the survey fully documented and access to the leakage data on the web.
The long answer is that it depends on what your objectives are and the size of your operation. The LeekSeek™ system is not just about detecting more leakages in shorter time. The LeekSeek™ system has been developed to address the most important issue of leakage detection which is that of repair. It has to be made clear that there is no money whatsoever to be saved in simply carrying out detection. Leakages have to be repaired quickly in order to achieve cost reductions. The problem of repair grows with the size of the operation. Many surveys reveal hundreds, sometimes thousands, of leakages and they are all associated with one form of remedial action or supply of parts. Without documentation and a system to handle this, the repair becomes either delayed, which costs money in the form of leakage cost per day, or as in most cases repairs will slide down the priority list and will not be completed. The LeekSeek™ system provides all the information you require for effective repair, such as the total remedial requirements, parts list by supplier and brand, priority leakages, volume and cost, location by department and workplace. If you don’t have a system, this information is time consuming to obtain and causes problems and delays in the repair process. A plant does not have to be very big for this to become a problem. Most companies also under estimate the value of historical data. The LeekSeek™ system identifies the various problems that are the true causes of leakages so that you can take preventative action in order to avoid them. It may be certain brands, applications, methods or areas within the plant that have an above average leakage rate. Once these are identified and remedied the leakage rate will be decreased on a permanent basis. If this issue is not addressed you will never achieve a low leakage rate, you will simply return to the same level of leakages, time and time again which becomes a very expensive alternative. The whole objective of the LeekSeek™ system is to reduce the leakages on a permanent basis to the minimum accepted level of leakages and a managed situation. This is by far a more economical alternative as you will not only have a lower leakage rate, it will ultimately require less leakage detection and less replacement of parts.
Is it a good idea to just do the worst?
It is never a bad idea to find and repair leakages. However, even if you do a very good job, the value of the remaining leakages will still justify a survey and then you might as well use an outside source to do the complete survey to begin with. The possible savings in labour you have in doing the worst yourself is quickly consumed by the costs you incur in the repair process compared to using an outside source and doing it faster and more efficiently. Secondly, unless you document well, you will fail to register vital information that will lead to technical improvements. |
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