[Mark Layport]

A/V = Atmospheric Vent

[Mark Layport]

BOY I feel your “pain” here brother! I fit your description to a tee, 40+ yr.s of experience and out of work for about 2 yr.s. I applied for a job here locally, they wanted a Sr Piping Designer with 10 yr.s experience, I thought this is going to be a sure thing. I called in and they wanted to setup an appointment and do an interview, THEN they say we’ll put you down in front of a computer and see how you do with 3D design. I ask what program are they using? CadWORX …I clearly state on my resume that I’ve had the introductory course on CadWORX, but never got the chance to use it on a project. AND that course was 5 yr.s ago and Rev 12, and I’d probably be rusty. Well they now didn’t want anything to do with me! I told them I got probably pick it up in 2 to 3 weeks, but they wanted someone to do what they needed now! I asked did they get many formally trained SR piping designers with 40+ yr.s experience coming in? ..No interest, they’d pass up on the experience and go with someone that knew a DRAFTING program!
Well I lucked out and finally found a job, but it’s project oriented, ie I have a job as long as the project last. which is fine for now, in that 2 yr.s off I’ve put in my retirement paperwork and I got to “play” in my shop or go fishing when ever I wanted, so if this position falls through, then I know what I’ll be doing! *G* …In my last few years doing this job, I’ve seen a number of basic issues pop up and cause major problems, and I tried to tell/show what was done in the pass to eliminate them. I felt like the little Dutch boy with his finger in the dike! But I’ve come to know I’ve done nothing that will have any meaning in this industry (piping design) the way things are done, who does them, and how they are done is changing way too fast …and those in charge don’t see the problem, they see the trouble, but that’s it.
The world turns and every thing changes, and that doesn’t change, so I’ll put in my few remaining yr.s/months, do the best job I can, and try to avoid being my wife’s house maid and cook for as long as I can! *G*

[Mark Layport]

War Stores my favorite!
Late 80’s, I had gotten a sr piping designers job at a new semi large DOT pipeline company. They were just starting to finishing up construction and wanted to start a design/drafting dept for operations of this line. I had been there for about 3 month, I had gotten back in the office from the field and all the other guys in the office were packing up their stuff! I asked what was going on? All I got was, have you talked with the lead engineer yet? I told them I haven’t I was just gotten out of the field, and they said you need to talk with the lead guy. I go to his office and he’s talking with the VP of the operations group. It seems someone had been caught taking kick backs from contractors and the owners had fired everybody! EXCEPT one young engineer, one secretary, and one piping designer (me).
We stood around for about 2 weeks wondering what to do, when the young engineer called me in to his office said the owner just contacted him and they wanted us to finish design and construction of one of the pump stations! …And they wanted it done in 3 weeks! Actually this wasn’t as bad as it sounded, the original engineering company generated a “cookie cutter design” for a pump station and had a number of the spool pieces fabricated and numbered. The issue was these parts were spread from our location to half way across the states! So I got to go back and forth trying find the parts, then get them loaded up, and shipped to the construction site. Once there to have some equipment lined up to off load these items for installation …some of them where very large. This last part of this job was new to me, but once I got to know the people it went pretty well. We are get close the deadline and we still were missing some major valving, like a 24″-600#RTJ type ball valve, with and actuator! I basically copied what we use on the other pump station sites and brought the list into the engineers office so he could order them. He had a phone stuck in this ear and a semi heated conversation going on. Now normally I would have back out the waited, but these items needed to be ordered now! So I got in his face about them. After he listen to my sepal, he looks at me and says “You take Care of It!” …I reminded him I have no authority to order anything! He didn’t care “deal with it” were his last words to me. SO I do a check in 3 different place on pricing, availability, and shipping for this valve and actuator, then I place and order …for $60,000!!!
6 months later I get a Email form accounting at the main office, they were alittle huffy that I made this purchase and what looks like with no authorization to do so! Also they don’t see any paperwork that it was ever received!?? I wrote and explained that the project engineer had given me “special authorization” to make the purchase. And that I operate out of the local office here and not at pump station site so that I don’t have any paperwork that it was ever received. BUT that it’s highly likely that the valving and operator I ordered were there because it was part of the main pipeline and the facility has been up and running now for the last 3 months
I never heard another word about it. *G*

[Mark Layport]

I “suggest” you don’t generate “standard rules” for designing anything. I have found that if you do you’ll always run into a situation that will defy these rules, then it’s an up-hill battle to get something accepted. What I do suggest is generating “rules of thumb”, that will guide designers in the direction you want them to go without putting walls in their path to design anything, after all they are “designers” (something you want to foster). It’ll also help eliminating alot of those up-hill battles I had mentioned. …Good Luck!

[Mark Layport]

You can put it anywhere you want, BUT there are “ramifications” to some locations …as I indicated in my earlier reply about the ASME code issue. I personally had skirt vents added to and existing vessel they want to re-use in the oil fields. We were able to do this without re-coding the vessel because we didn’t violate the coded main body of the vessel.
Now playing the devil’s advocate and you wanted to added that pipe guide square in the middle side of the coded vessel, you can do that, BUT you’ll have to do a PWHT to code, and maybe re-line the inside of the vessel if it had a lining. AND we’re talking about alot of money to do it …and I didn’t even touch on the transportation cost.
You can do what you want, aslong as you got the money to cover the action. …Just like every other thing in this world.

[Mark Layport]

Putting a steam header below ground is not impossible. The 2 main questions are WHY do you need to (bottom line how much money are you prepared to spend on this)?
And …For how long a run (there are other ways to routing lines that are normally buried, but routed above grade …40, 60 foot + or -, but it starts to get impractical after that )?

[Mark Layport]

Well the easy answer is YES …and NO! “IF” this vessel is an ASME coded vessel, and after adding your modifications, your are NOT prepared to re-code the vessel (which cost some money) then the answer is NO! UNLESS you down grade that vessel to basically a zero-pressure container, which it remain in that classification the rest of it’s life. Now I’m assuming that your adding a connection of some type …Nozzel or coupling.
However if your adding some type of “support”, as long as it’s on the skirt area (or support leg) and not close enough to the main body (vessel containment) that the heat effected zone of the weld effectes that portion of the coded vessel, then YES. …Clear as mud!??

[Mark Layport]

“Laser Scamming” …That’s an interesting title, I haven’t heard of it be fore, BUT I agree with it. I haven’t had a whole lot of experience with it, but i had some insight when it first came out. I was working on a project that was pretty big, it was planned to do this project in multiple phases, so the client could continue to operate as this project progressed. We had done phase one, but there were alot of delays because the client hadn’t kept up with doing as-built documentation from when the plant was first built, so additions and modifications were now obstacles to be documented before the new design could be developed and detailed. SO as phase 2 rolled around some bright young engineer suggested a company that does 3D laser scanning. It was pricey but this company would come out and do the scanning then they would give us the computer program (plus mentoring to operate it) to look at these scans to ascertain the data we needed. This was ALL this laser scanning company provided!
So I was the original designer on the first phase and was very familiar with the general layout, so I used this 3d “point cloud” to get some data. I tried it a number of times but what I was getting “seemed” to be wrong …close but it didn’t feel right. Finally I zeroed on a piping system I KNEW and used the system to look at it …it was a perfect look, dead on the pipe at about 90 Deg.s …this system told me it was a 3″ pipe! In reality it was 4″, i know because I measured it and modified a section of other end of this piping system. I pointed this out to “mentor” and she said that there is a margin of error, and now I’m thinking then WHY are we even doing this if this scanning!??
Now that’s been a number of years ago, I’m hoping this scanning has gotten better, but I know for sure the price is still high, and that has been a limiting factor in the area I work, maybe in the next decade?.

[Mark Layport]

my experience fluid codes are generated by owner companys or engineering firms that generate their own codes for the client company, but nothing “standard”.

[Mark Layport]

Using the philosophy of coming off the top of gas headers and off the bottom on liquid headers is more of a “well meaning wife’s tale” then a good design practice. Case in point, we all know (or should) that water sinks to the bottom of hydrocarbon liquid fuels, so putting branch connections off the bottom to protect from getting vapors if off the top would not protect anything, and possibly make things worse under the original scenario.
It’s been my experience, working on existing facilities, that how you come off main headers is more dictated by how easy the branch connection attachment is going to be plus how you’re going to support the new branches. So they all tend to come off the main headers in the same way in each facility …top or bottom, for ease of construction & support.
As to contaminants in the main header, wouldn’t it be better to deal with that issue under daily operation, as apposed to total facility shut-down to address the issue in the main header? So if you had a gas line with a branch connection on the bottom, it could and probably does pick up the liquid(s). These are easily dealt with …“dead legs” or in-line strainer/filters (at levels where maintenance is very easy) makes these issues manageable under normal operation.
Note – IF any contaminate in a commodity, to any piece of equipment, was or is in the “catastrophic” category there will be (or should be) some type of filtering equipment or special arrangement to eliminate that issue. And they won’t rely on how the branch connections came off the main headers.

[Mark Layport]

I agree with everyone else, especially JOP’s on the sunshine comment! Designers should document what the end dimension should be, or Mike Vezina comment about a “long” leg spool. It’s up to the fabricator to apply and root gaps THEY feel should be used for THEIR efforts to make all the spools required. In fact every fabricator I’ve had dealings with, ALL generate their own fabrication spools drawings documenting each spool and what THEY want for a weld gaps, after all they are responsible for their work. Remember thought they are working from your drawings, so you need to be correct and present that info in a clear and uncluttered manner!

[Mark Layport]

Using threaded studs on threaded lugged butterfly valves is NOT a wise way to go! To do this you need a “break out spool” up against the valve or pretty close to it. Because there is no “easy way” to remove the studs to be able to remove the valve by just “dropping it out”.
What we normally do in my area is used threaded hex head bolts, ones that thread half way into the threaded lug section of the valve. That way we can use butterfly valves as block valves on tanks and in locations that having break out spools is not appropriate. As I view this you need to remember your piping design configurations is for the operators of the facility, and making maintenance an easy operation is key to a “good design”.

[Mark Layport]

Sch 10 Pipe! …That’s the main problem, ESPECIALLY at larger sizes. The wall thickness is just too thin. I’ve had jobs where the company piping spec called out for Sch.10 and the fabricator called back and told them he couldn’t guarantee that where wouldn’t be any damage to the pipe wall from just shipping & handling. The cure for this is jumping up to Sch.20, 30, or even Sch.40 wall.
You need to remember the rule about “odd-ball” piping, it’s odd-ball because it’s not normally used, so if dictated that’s what to use the suppliers have to special order that stuff, adding up the cost. As apposed to using more commonly used piping components and schedules, using these items does not usually add a significant cost increase and at times reduces the cost. …Good Luck!

[Mark Layport]

There are a number of issues with this topic. First as Anton has point out welding on galvanized pipe DOES produce toxic flumes and will make the welder very ill for about a 24 hr.s period …this doesn’t happen with one whiff but after 15 to 30 minutes of continuous welding, especially in enclosed areas. IF you ever suffer this poisoning drink alot of milk!
Secondly “normal” instrument air system that uses a galvanized piping spec call out 2″ and below because they are a threaded connection. Now you may be able to find 3″ or even 4″ galvanized threaded fitting, but they are considered “odd ball”, and when ANY piping component has that label you can bet that there cost with be ever high, and lead time to get them will be extended too, so the delay will add to the cost …(and I’m not even getting into the fact that at those odd ball sizes they probably don’t meet piping spec being used).
Lastly, and probably most important, connecting galvanized steel to bear carbon steel (by any means …threaded or welded) leads to galvanic action or “bimetallic corrosion”, this is where an electro-chemical process in which one metal corrodes preferentially when it is in electrical contact with another. I have seen where galvanized pipe is thread to a carbon steel valve and within 4 to 5 months corrosive pitting at the connection had caused leaks.
NOW if this increase in pipe size or where connection galvanized piping is absolutely necessary there is a way to do this, and that is with the use of bronze coupling or a dietectric union (http://www.jomarvalve.com/products/categories/dielectricunions.html) …basically this is where bronze is positioned between the galvanized spec piping and the bear carbon steel piping, the bronze stops the electro-chemical process.
This type of info is necessary to the good designer to layout their piping and to remind the Jr engineers that think they know what they are doing! *G*

[Mark Layport]

Well I have to toss my hat in this ring too! Been out of work for about a month and a half. One of the reasons I live where I do is because we are located dead in the middle of a 100+ year old oil field, and for the most part I have been employed the whole time for the last 30 years of being here, with the exception of 09 when President Obama was elected, and I was out for about 10 months.
I own a home here and I have about 4 more years before I “think” about trying to retire, so like everyone else you try to hang on until the oil prices pick back up, which I believe will be in 2017. It’s pretty simple actually, it’s about the 2 biggest oil producers in the world (the U.S. and the Saudis). Each wants to NOT give up their market share …period and then over produce their oil to make up the differences. Until they decide to limit production, oil will remain low, and oil companies will operate on limited budgets …ie no new projects.
Now if you have the capability of being mobile and can move to other locations there are other piping jobs, in different areas other than oil, but being flexible is the key, then you can make it through this ruff period! …Just like last time, and the time before that, and the time before that.

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