Maintenance strategies to improve sootblower availability
Sootblowers are electromechanical devices used for removal of ash and slag deposits from boiler tube surfaces. By directing steam, air, or water cleaning medium through a nozzle to remove deposits from boiler tubes, boilers are kept on-line for longer periods of time reducing the need for outages to clean the boiler by mechanical means. Fuel must be burned efficiently to minimize stagging and fouling of the heat transfer surfaces. Tuning the boiler to maximize combustion efficiency should not be limited to optimizing fuel conditions, air-fuel ratios, firing rates, excess air, and over-fire air, but should also include the use of sootblowers. The goal is to know when to clean, and if the cleaning cycle has effectively removed the deposit and increased heat transfer. Today, boiler cleaning technology not only focuses on the impact of the sootblowing system on overall boiler performance, but it also focuses on design improvements that impact an individual sootblower`s performance. Proper sootblower maintenance is an integral part of making existing designs and new designs work. Existing computer technologies provide a viable means of documenting and trending sootblower performance data and maintenance history. The personal computer and the availability of spreadsheet and database software make the task of quantifying sootblower performance data and maintenance history easier to achieve. The difficult task is gathering the proper data to make decisions about sootblowing operations and maintenance. The balance of this paper will discuss typical maintenance practices, and improvements that can be achieved by documenting sootblowing system inspections and maintenance activity using a personal computer database.
- Research Organization:
- Electric Power Research Inst. (EPRI), Palo Alto, CA (United States); Baltimore Gas and Electric Co., MD (United States)
- OSTI ID:
- 401962
- Report Number(s):
- EPRI-TR-106753; CONF-960719-; TRN: 96:005874-0046
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: Fossil plant maintenance conference, Baltimore, MD (United States), 29 Jul - 1 Aug 1996; Other Information: PBD: Jul 1996; Related Information: Is Part Of Proceedings: 1996 EPRI fossil plant maintenance conference; PB: 677 p.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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