Boiler up riser water tube failure
Boiler up riser water tube failure
(OP)
Is it common for boiler water tubes to fail? I have an O type water tube boiler (1 steam drum 1 mud drum) that produces 400psig at 650 deg F superheated steam in the plant. This failed water tube was an up riser tube closest to the burner end. We capped it off and welded it. It no longer connects to the steam drum. Is this common in boiler plants? It is 25 years into its 30 yr ops expectancy.





RE: Boiler up riser water tube failure
RE: Boiler up riser water tube failure
RE: Boiler up riser water tube failure
RE: Boiler up riser water tube failure
RE: Boiler up riser water tube failure
The tube surface appears badly corroded and I would not be surprised if adjacent have the same degree of corossion. May want to chip the adjacent tube surfaces inseveral sections and smooth out those tubes surface for tube thickness check.
RE: Boiler up riser water tube failure
RE: Boiler up riser water tube failure
I'd recommend that your next turnaround or outage that you do some thickness testing on adjacent tubes and go in your drums and look up and/or down each tube as far as you can see to check for scale build up. Use a borescope to look at the tubes past the bends that limit your sight line.
If this tube blew, you might be sitting on a tickng time bomb.
rmw