How Does Your Compressed
Air Purity Monitoring
Procedure Measure Up?
Are Regular ISO 8573 Audits Sufficient?
Compressed air quality audits are rarely
carried out in strict compliance with ISO
8573 and a lot can happen in between
them that can seriously affect your
reputation and profitability. Whether
strict compliance is important for you
is more a consideration of maintaining
your site quality standards and the air
purity records need to reflect the actual
system conditions. The methods used in
the audits for measuring each impurity
type, the length of sample times and
the conclusions drawn from the results
must be appropriate and repeatable but
are enough questions asked about the
methods before the audit?
There have been occasions where
the test results were genuine but at a
lower purity class than expected and
contractors have been told to re-test
by a manager in denial. If your auditor
knows that you expect an air purity
result of 1:2:1, are you certain they
couldn’t skew the results to meet this
in order to get paid and move on to the
next job?
48 FDPP - www.fdpp.co.uk
For many companies, in-house
verification of compressed air quality
supplements their external ISO
8573 audits to give a more complete
understanding of delivered air quality.
This reinforces their site quality
standards by providing more frequent
measurement points,highlighting trends
that may indicate the need for planning
remedial action before contamination
levels become problematic.
Water will condense or evaporate
according to temperature and pressure
changes throughout the air distribution
system and relying on the dew point
readings from the sensor on the dryer
in the plant room, is not likely to provide
sufficient certainty all across the site.
Standalone dew point sensors with
integral displays and alarm relay outputs
are a very inexpensive way of providing
point of use verification that the
delivered air is dry within the expected
limits.
Organic and inorganic particulates can
be measured with laser particle counters
and while they won’t differentiate
between them or indicate inert or
viable microbiologicals, having a sensor
permanently measuring at critical points
in the system will give rapid indication
of increased levels that would prompt
further investigation.
Removing the need for sending oil
samples away for laboratory analysis
through the use of modern PID
sensors, provides a quick, accurate and
repeatable assessment of oil vapour
with an almost instant indication of
system changes. They also offer online
24/7 monitoring with alarm outputs.
Would you rather know beforehand or is
it safe to assume everything will be fine
until the next 6 monthly audit?
Red Dragon Ltd t/a Measure Monitor
Control
Unit 15 Abergorki Industrial Estate
Ynyswen Road
Treorchy
CF42 6DL
01443 772500
[email protected]
www.measuremonitorcontrol.com