Location: Immingham

Area of expertise: Manufacturing Storage and Warehousing   

Background

One of the world’s leading producers of high-quality titanium products, producing at its peak, over 100,000t of product each year. 

The client suffered a partial collapse of a multi-compartment tank, which lead to the need for the installation of individual tanks as replacement for the original one, which were then to be decommissioned. They came to us for a solution.

Solution

The project involved the replacement of a large five compartment open top process tank that had originally been constructed piecemeal but then fully welded in situ. Following the failure of one of the tank walls, it was a plant requirement to replace that compartment while the others remained in use.

The solution was to remove the failed section and replace it with an individual tank that was fabricated off-site.

In order to lift the new tank into position, the building roof was modified at one end to incorporate specially designed removable hatches. After the tank was lifted into position through the open section of roof onto the process floor, the roof hatches were replaced using the same crane that lifted in the tank.

The tank was then transported internally into position along the building using the existing overhead gantry crane. This carefully calculated process was repeated so that each section of the existing tank was replaced with a new individual tank.

Results

Our solution allowed for production to be continuous and remain online throughout the repair and replacement timeframe. Fabricating offsite allowed for a quick and efficient erection. 

Without our knowledge and expertise, process would have gone offline and had a devastating impact on production.