Projects

Sabine River Pump Station

During the drought of 2011, a cooling water lake at a power plant in East Texas reached severely low levels endangering the operation of the massive generation units with the likelihood of forced outage. With a projected timeline till shut down of 60 days and no rain in the forecast, Advanced Industries worked with plant project engineering from original drawings to provide product expertise and source of supply of materials required to construct the Sabine River Pump Station. From large diameter couplings to expansion joints, flanges, cement lined steel pipe and fittings, and even a 30″ flow meter manufactured in Europe, AI delivered on time and in time for the 30″ water line to flow at up to 30,000 GPM, maintaining lake operating levels since.

Railcar Steam Delivery

When one of the nation’s leading railcar producers needed steam delivery for their massive linings facility, Advanced Industries product experts were called on to consult and provide products for the ground floor operation from the boiler through the curing process. Working with plant personnel and primary products from Spence Engineering and Nicholson Steam Trap, AI staff provided recommendations, products, and expertise to deliver steam and reduce condensate for the consistent and successful operation of steam tables, autoclaves, and elastomer curing.

Chemical Plant Premium Efficiency Motors

Advanced continues to work with an East Texas Chemical plant in reviewing applications and assisting in the selection of Baldor premium efficiency severe duty cast iron motors to replace standard duty sheet steel motors in smaller horsepowers. Ongoing results include reduced energy consumption, reduced downtime, and maintenance in these severe duty applications.

12 Location Vendor Managed Inventory

When a large Texas chemical facility began to review its usage and requirements for tube fittings through its vendor managed inventory and capital projects group, Advanced Industries was asked to offer both its Tylok product line and VMI program proposals for consideration. After months of product testing by the end-user, costs analysis, consideration of AI’s record of excellence in the supply and proposed processes, the end-user elected to approve Tylok products and award the overall program to Advanced. After nearly a year of serving the 12 VMI locations, product reliability, consistent availability and up-front costs, have shown thousands of dollars in savings to the plant.

LED Efficiency

After years of poor lighting, high maintenance and inefficiency, a large plastics producer called on Advanced Industries to consult with them to improve their plant lighting with specific applications and units in mind. AI through its alliance with Dialite LED products, worked with plant engineers, maintenance and capital project supervisors to train and review the products available, determine costs versus other brand name competitor offerings, and survey the plant(s) for specific product selection. A matrix of product-specific to the application was developed, and the operation is continuing to show cost savings through energy efficiency, reduced maintenance, operations satisfaction and safety improvements as they continue to convert to Dialite products plant-wide.

Steel Mill Drive Project

Advanced worked with ABB and a large north Texas steel mill to install drives throughout 3 mills as well as the processing and recycling areas of the plant. With as many as 56 drives needing to work in conjunction with one another, the job was very in-depth and challenging. Certain parts of the application required conveyors to work in conjunction with large shearing motors as large as 750HP needing regenerative capabilities. With the experience, we have on-staff we were able to supply the drives mounted on panels with resistors, disconnects, fuses, etc. The drives were delivered with plug and play capabilities to work in accordance with the existing PLC’s.

Steel Mill MCC Project

Aging equipment and control is a growing concern in today’s industrial marketplace. Advanced is currently working with an area steel mill to replace aging Cutler Hammer motor control centers with new SIEMENS Arc Flash Resistant motor control centers. SIEMENS offers levels of Arc Flash Resistance that the customer can choose based upon their needs. We are scheduled to be replacing 16 MCC’s over the next 4 years.

Case Studies

Fire Water Pump Motor

When the main 250 Horsepower Fire Water Pump Motor went down at a major Industrial Complex, safety and compliance caused the plant engineering staff to scramble. With no success in locating an exact replacement on their own, the plant called on Advanced industries to help.   With access to extensive motor resources, Advanced Industries staff located a drop-in replacement, and the motor was installed by plant staff within 36 hours. From quality products like ABB Baldor, Teco Westinghouse, Weg and more, to our in house motor product specialists, our motor management program can help you evaluate your motor spend and offer product reliability and costs savings.

Elevator Cable

A local Cement plant had to replace a special cable used on an elevator approximately every 6 months since 2007. The cable was costing approximately $19,000/order versus a one-time order of $27,188.

Advanced took the cable’s specifications and was able to work with a manufacturer to outfit the cable with a Kevlar-reinforced jacket. While the initial cost was approximately 30% more, the cable has now been in use for over five years.

This cable has saved Cement plant money on the cable replacement costs and has prevented downtime.

Transformers

A field service employee worked with electricians at a cement plant to retrofit discontinued items for a shutdown. All material was delivered on time, with exact dimensions.

  • 2-500KVA
  • 1-750KVA
  • 1-1000KVA

Transformers were delivered to the site on a required date per spec and placed into immediate service causing no unplanned downtime.

Halliburton Valve

Cement plant uses a Halliburton dual rotor valve on their silos for distribution. When the valve was discontinued, Advanced Industries picked up the old valve, sourced a manufacturer, and was able to get the valve cast and remanufactured to the customer’s specifications.

The newly manufactured valve included a slightly modified mounting bracket for an easier fit, and an oversized cylinder for quicker operation and less loss of material.

The new valves have been in service for 7 years, and Advanced was able to offer these valves at an approximate 10% better price than the original.

Halliburton valve

Wire Theft

Batch plants across DFW have had a problem with copper theft. When the Desoto batch plant was hit by copper thieves, Advanced had all the necessary wire and materials in stock to get the plant running.

The batch plant maintenance team was able to get to work getting the plant up and running the same day the problem was found.

Advanced was also able to supply the batch plants with floodlights, in a very timely manner, to light the area and discourage any further damage.

Arc Flash Gear

After an electrical audit, a cement plant was mandated to have certain ARC FLASH protection. Advanced worked with them in order to outfit electricians with proper protection.

Advanced talked with the electricians who would be wearing the protection on a daily basis. This enabled Advanced to provide clothing similar to the clothing already being worn, but with the necessary ARC FLASH protection.

Advanced was able to provide blue jeans, work shirts, sweatshirts, jackets, gloves, blankets, hot sticks, face shields to the workers.

Slurry Valve Packing Leaks

Lignite / Coal-fired power plants process tons of ash per day. Knife gate valves in bottom ash slurry are often over pressured causing packing leaks and other damage to the valves.

AI was asked to help provide product solutions that could reduce maintenance and keep operations going in this tough application. AI along with Fabricast Valve LLC collected all the operating data available and began the process of a series of modifications to the FV150 series knife gate valve.

With the addition of a cone deflector to reduce wear and a newly designed liner with special UCP packing, the new application-specific valve has proven to be a moderately priced valve, with extended life and fewer packing leaks than more expensive competing valve brands.

Steam Utilization Solutions

When a Texas chemical plant began to purchase their steam from an outside source, the true cost of utilities was realized immediately. Advanced Industries was asked to recommend solutions to identify steam loss within the facility, and propose best choice steam traps for the multiple non-process applications such as steam tracing lines and condensate drip legs.

AI arranged for a complete plant survey of steam leaks, failed steam traps and other steam loss issues, and worked with plant reliability to develop a trap selection guide of Nicholson Steam Traps. Steam purchased per month was reduced by many thousands of dollars immediately as solutions provided were acted on.

AI continues to provide products and field support including site inspections and training of plant operations and maintenance personnel as costs of operation continue to see positive effects.

Soft starts

A customer was in need of 5 enclosed heavy-duty soft starts built to their specs within a set time frame. We checked with multiple manufacturers and none could meet the time frame based on the requirements of the customer.

Advanced Industries used in house knowledge and parts to build and test the soft starts to the customer’s requirement and was able to have them delivered on-site within the specified time frame allowing no delays in the project at hand.