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Charcoal Manufacturer Improves Inventory Accuracy & Reliability

PROBLEM:
“We used a cable running up the side of the silo through the top and down inside with a weight attached to the end inside the silo. The end on the outside was attached to a hand winch.  We would release the winch, lower the cable until it appeared it had hit the material surface.  Then we would take a reading from a marker on the cable on the outside.” There were a total of eight silos of various heights.

This type of measurement was made on silos containing wood chip and wood flour.  These are ingredients in the charcoal manufacturing process. There were a total of eight silos of various heights.  Wood chip and wood flour are processed into briquettes and fired.  This is a simplification of the process and may not be a completely accurate description, but the actual process is proprietary to each manufacturer.

EXPLANATION:
The problem that was created was measurement error and inconsistency due to the manual method employed and human error in making this manual measurement.  It was very frequent that they were way off in readings and the measurement of the cable outside the silo was always an “eyeball guess”.

SOLUTION:SiloPatrol SE
The charcoal manufacturer wanted to eliminate the human element in making these measurements and improve accuracy of measurement and reliability of data.  The solution was the SiloPatrol® inventory monitoring system from Monitor Technologies.  The SiloPatrol inventory monitoring system is a smart weight & cable based sensor system.  This state-of-the-art weight & cable system is a proven problem solver.  Wood chips have a bulk density of about 20-30 lbs/ft3 and wood flour is even lighter at about 15-20 lbs/ft3.  In addition, the dielectric constant was very low, running around 1.7 or lower.  The local Monitor representative arranged a demonstration and to date eight silos have been equipped with the system, including an HMIHMI that operators and users read data from.  The lightweight nature of the material was no problem and the low dielectric constant has no effect on the performance of this smart cable-based sensor system.  The SiloPatrol system eliminated the manual measurement process, the time taken to make the manual measurements, improved accuracy of measurement and overall reliability.  The charcoal manufacturer realized savings in time and material.  The system has been in use successfully for the past four years.

Give Monitor Technologies a call and let us put our creative solutions to work for you!

 

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SiloPatrol® SE
Measuring coal powder levels when nothing else will work ….

Coal-fired power plants are commonplace around the world.  In order for these power generating stations to create huge amounts of electricity the turbines need to be feed with steam and the steam created by boilers that are fired by … yep, coal.  But coal as it comes from the mining operations is not what is fed to the burners.  First it is ground or pulverized into powder.  It is not unusual for the coal powder to be stored in silos awaiting the demand for it to be fed to the burners.  The inventory of coal powder in these silos needs to be monitored to allow for efficient operation of the power plant.

So, how do we monitor the inventory of coal powder in a silo?  Not easily.  In one typical application the power plant personnel found that the only technology that would work reliably is the modern smart weight & cable system from Monitor Technologies LLC, the SiloPatrol® SE.

SiloPatrol_coal Application

Anhui Tongling power plant in Anhui province in China had tried almost ever technology possible to get a reliable level measurement in their 5 coal powder silos.  Radar, ultrasonic and others were tried, but none worked reliably.  It wasn’t until Beijing Conasen walked in and proposed that the Tongling plant use the SiloPatrol SE smart cable-based inventory monitoring system that the power plant personnel found a reliable solution.

Mr. William Yuan, sales manager for Beijing Conasen indicates that the power plant tried many major brands of ultrasonic, radar, and other technologies but that due to good relations with the Tongling plant personnel he was able to sell three SiloPatrol SE model SMU sensors and an HMI operator interface to them.  The units were installed by plant personnel.  Because of the heavy amount of coal dust in the silos an air purge using dry compressed air was used.  The SiloPatrol sensor incorporates the patent-pending use of Hall-effect sensor technology, a split-compartment enclosure, microcontroller, redundant optics and many other valuable features and technology to ensure reliable measurement even in challenging dust applications like coal powder.

The SiloPatrol SE system has been working reliably and the plant has since purchased two additional sensors and connected them into the same HMI operator interface.  This same sensor technology is working reliably at other coal-fired power stations in China as well.

For more information on the SiloPatrol SE click here or contact Monitor Technologies LLC at 800-766-6486 in the USA and 630-365-9403 worldwide.

 

>>Click here for more information about SiloPatrol SE from Monitor Technologies.
>>Download Product Bulletin 343A

 

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