Page 117: of Maritime Reporter Magazine (November 1996)

Company Achieves Greater Oil Tanker

Cleaning Efficiency

During the last four years, BHP

Petroleum has used Airloader

Pumps for tank cleaning on its three offshore oil production facili- ties, Challis Venture, Jabiru

Venture and Skua Venture in the

Brain Industries undertook a new design with an increase in jet- pump suction airflow from 600 cu. ft. per minute to 900 cu. ft. per minute at up to 26 in. of mercury vacuum poten- tial. The pumping vessel was redesigned and the

Timor Sea.

The Airloader Pumps are manu- factured by Brain Industries Pty.

Ltd., based in Sydney, Australia.

Keith Hobbs, Brain's managing director, said, "Airloader Pumps are really packaged pneumatic conveying devices" and as such can far exceed what is normally expect- ed from regular pumps and pump- ing techniques.

What this has meant to BHP

Petroleum is that the company uti- lized a compact, intrinsically safe unit, capable of sucking up the heavy and abrasive viscous crude oil contaminated sand and rust scale deposits from between the ribs in the bottom of its tanks, and in one operation discharging it via pipeline, either to another tank or over the side to another vessel.

The Airloader Pump is com- pressed air operated and has no electrics. It stays on deck with only the material suction hose descending down into the tank via the manway. Its powerful uplifting air velocity combined with high vacuum potential is reportedly capable of removing the worst material through an excess of 100 ft. of vertical suction lift into the pumping vessel at deck level.

There is no need to high pressure waterjet the material prior to suck- ing it up. It will suction load for a set time before switching to pres- sure discharge. It is capable of dis- charging the material several thousands of feet via a four-in. pipeline; returning to suction mode after discharging for a set time.

These suction and discharge times are adjusted according to tank depth, nature of material and discharge distance. Once set to give an optimum load and dis- charge cycle at the start of each job, the machine will continue to operate automatically thereafter.

The particular mode of Airloader

Pump used by BHP Petroleum until recently was of a design most suited to underground mining and tunnelling. "Although very suc- cessful for BHP" said Mr. Hobbs, "I definitely felt we could improve on its performance."

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Industries, Inc.

NELSON DIVISION

Exhaust & Filtration Systems 1801 U.S. Hwy. 51/138

P.O. Box 428

Stoughton, Wisconsin 53589-0428

U.S.A.

Telephone 608-873-4200

Telefax 608-873-1532

November, 1996 119