I am new to this wonderful forum. This is my first posting so if this question is asked somewhere please pardon me and try to navigate me for reply.
We are copper manufacturer rather we have single location largest copper smelter in the world. As you might be knowing copper is extracted through smelting process from sulphide ores.
Since it is an exothermic process, lot of heat is generated during smelting. The gas along with heat is passed through WASTE HEAT RECOVERY Boilers (WHRB)
My question to knowledgeable forum members is towards these Waste Heat Recovery Boilers only.

How to increase the Relaibility of these WHRB. There is quite numbers of failures in the form of Tube puncture and whole process of smelting got struck up.
Please suggest some methodology.
If if you know somebody directly or indirectly who knows this WHRB very well, please let us know , we shall contact them accordingly.

Regards,

Manoj Mathur

What is the operating temp and pressure of the WHRBs at inlet and outlet conditions? Do they have refractory linings? What is the tube material and total heat surface? What is the design code used?

For tube punctures, where are the locations of failures, at midspan? Don't you have tube to tubesheet weld failures?

Do you monitor the heat exchange process properly to prevent overheating eg during trips? I suspect you recover the heat to generate steam.

Do you perform IRIS tube inspection during shutdown for measuring tube wall thinning?

Do you monitor water quality properly for the boiler feed water?

Do the WHRBs use tube inserts at inlet?

Do you do retubing in situ?

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Josh,

Hullo Manoj,
You know the WHRB design and construction as well as their failure history well. We do not have access to this information, so we end up guessing possible causes. To make our responses meaningful, please give us some details, e.g., whether shell and tube construction, temperatures at inlet/outlet, particulate count, gas velocities, inspection results - where are the failures, is it due to erosion, corrosion, impingement, creep, fatigue etc.?
I suggest you also ask members of POMC Club website and Indiaboilers.com as they deal a lot with boiler failures.