Butt welded or Socket welded
Butt welded or Socket welded
(OP)
Greetings all
I have kind of a delema that I am wondering what other users do.
I am installing a solvent transfer line in a chemical plant. The line is small, 1" sch 40 A106 pipe. Welding is GTAW. I originally spec'd the line out as butt welded. I did not want any solvent hold up in the cracks in case the plant ended up switching the line to another solvent down the road. Cross contamination can be a big quality issue. However I am wondering if I should have just specified socket welded and if they want to change solvents later then we can worry about flushing the line, later. I think the socket welded piping would have saved me about 25% on the job. I have several more of these coming up. What would you reccomend? We are industrial chemicals, not pharma or CGMP.
Regards
Stonecold
I have kind of a delema that I am wondering what other users do.
I am installing a solvent transfer line in a chemical plant. The line is small, 1" sch 40 A106 pipe. Welding is GTAW. I originally spec'd the line out as butt welded. I did not want any solvent hold up in the cracks in case the plant ended up switching the line to another solvent down the road. Cross contamination can be a big quality issue. However I am wondering if I should have just specified socket welded and if they want to change solvents later then we can worry about flushing the line, later. I think the socket welded piping would have saved me about 25% on the job. I have several more of these coming up. What would you reccomend? We are industrial chemicals, not pharma or CGMP.
Regards
Stonecold





RE: Butt welded or Socket welded
That way, you get credit for (1) asking and (2) trying to improve the next line.
RE: Butt welded or Socket welded
I know some sites that don´t want that because of expensive interchanging of defect valves.
Greetings
RE: Butt welded or Socket welded
So the question is: will reducing the amount of flushing solvent or the duration of the flush or the number of times the line is flushed, be worth this 25% extra cost? Doubt it, but that depends on a lot of stuff I don't know, like the expected service life, cost of solvent and recycling/disposal etc.
How about this: if it's just solvent, rather than solvent with product in it, and the solvent is volatile, why not pull a vacuum on the line and evaporate the solvent out of all those nooks and crannies instead? Works just as well with SW as with BW, but might take longer.