Automated Compressed Air Leak Detection? (via instrumentation)

[seasar]

A few weeks ago I had a voicemail from a cold-calling salesman regarding some equipment that if mounted in a compressed air header could be used to determine the
magnitude of and when system leaks occur. I dismissed it without retaining any contact info as I thought it to be very likely a waste of time.
Today out of curiosity I tried to find info on the web without success. I'm very familiar with handheld ultrasonic leak detection equipment (our plant uses ~ 3500 scfm and we have a regular PM to look for leaks)...searching for automated inline instrumentation with absolutely no luck.

Has anyone heard of this?

 

[Ron]

The way I've seen it done before is to mount pressure transsducers in the system and monitor pressure fluctuations. Alarms can be set for low pressure, high pressure, differential pressure across fitting, cycle frequency and a variety of other options. Hardware and software are off the shelf. Check Omega, Keithley Instruments and MicroMeasurements.

 

[DLite30]

My guess is that he was talking more about atmospheric ultrasonic noise monitoring such as this:

http://www.generalmonitors.com/products/gassonic_observer.html