Slurry pump condition monitoring
The Wirth Pump Monitoring System( WPMS™) enables early detection of critical issues allowing for preventive and condition based maintenance
Depending on customer requirements, the WPMS™ system can store data for several months to review logged data.
With a broad portfolio of condition monitoring tools, MHWirth assists its customers in optimising maintenance costs and improving operational predictability. The field-proven WPMS™ system( Wirth Pump Monitoring System) is a high frequency and real-time pulsation monitoring system for both triplex single-acting as well as in duplex double acting pumps. In addition to a continuous performance overview it enables early detection of critical issues allowing for preventive and condition based maintenance and increasing the pump’ s availability. MHWirth’ s WPMS™ system therefore reduces costs of ownership and at the same time increases the plant’ s productive time.
The WPMS™ system continuously monitors the following pump characteristics: n Suction and discharge performance n Piston and valve performance( leakage) n Pulsation equipment performance( suction and discharge) n Volumetric efficiency of the pump and each chamber The monitoring hardware is based on industry standards: high frequency pressure sensors continuously measure pressure for each stroke. The sensors are connected to a controller in the WPMS™ cubicle, where the live data analysis is executed, based on fieldproven and verified mathematical algorithms. The calculated values are visualised in an easyto-read graph( see right) on the operators’ screen. In addition to a continuous performance overview of the key pump characteristics, the screen also provides an automatic alarm in case of estimated failures. This allows for planned action before more critical issues arise.
The WPMS™ system can already be used in early project phases to optimise the pump’ s ramp-up process, and all the way through the operation. In addition to new slurry pumps, MHWirth’ s WPMS™ system is also suitable for retrofitting existing triplex single-acting and duplex double acting pumps. Using the integrated remote access, experts from MHWirth can directly connect to the pump for deeper analysis and troubleshooting.
A Wirth™ triplex single-acting piston diaphragm pump is working at Fairbreeze mineral sands mine
Typical WPMS™ screen
Typical WPMS™ setup of main components
MARCH 2018 Supplement | International Mining P5