Process Heater Tube Temperature Monitoring Overview, Best Practices, and Examples
Article published in the Inspectioneering Journal July/August 2022 Issue.
High-temperature IR Thermography was pioneered several decades ago as a method for understanding tube temperatures inside fired equipment. While the equipment continues to improve, completing accurate analysis of the data remains very challenging. It is a complex process to accurately measure tube wall temperatures due to the variable nature of surface scale, combustion characteristics, and reflected radiation. Given the correct equipment and technique, proper application in the field, and correct data analysis, thermography can be very accurate.
The published article highlights some applications and tools, to help monitor and produce adequate data, that can be consistently accurate to within 5° C of true operating conditions. This can be a very valuable approach to keep equipment safe and reliable and may enable operations to capture high-profit margin opportunities.
This article also discusses some best practices and provides case studies from recent projects completed by the Becht Fired Heater group. Contact Grant Jacobson for more information about essential tools available to understand risk and optimize fired equipment.
The entire article, published in the July/August 2022 issue of Inspectioneering, can be viewed HERE.
