Remote Valve Diagnosis (RVD) is a new proprietary system that monitors, acquires, registers and transmits critical ball valve performance information back to the maintenance personnel. The purpose of RVD is to provide real time condition information from a valve within any location, providing an alarm in the case of malfunction.
The main feature of RVD system is to provide affordable information about the tightness of the ball valve in real time. A patent pending algorithm continuously monitors pressures from the separate sections of a trunnion ball valve (upstream side, downstream side and body cavity) and compares the trend of these values with the pre-installed data for trends expected of a valve in good working conditions. If a tightness change is detected the system provides an alarm to the operator, who can decide on how to best plan preventative maintenance on the valve. The leak test can be performed also with valve in the open position. The pressure type of sensors can be selected to comply with your process system specifications.
| RVD BENEFITS | |
|---|---|
| Remote Valve Diagnosis | |
| Parameters real time analysis | RVD remotely provides and transmits information about the valve’s working condition without the intervention of the operator |
| Extremely sensitive leak detection system | A patent pending algorithm detects the presence of very small leakages, both in-line and to the ambient |
| Reduced maintenance costs | The valve status monitoring allows to plan preventative maintenance only when actually necessary |
| Accurate obturator position measurement | RVD is able to measure the obturator position directly from the ball, independently from the drive chain torsional deformations and gaps |
| Reduced plant downtime | The maintenance optimization reduces time waste |
| Enhanced safety | The ambient leakage remote detection deletes the risk of injury to operators |
| Increased plant efficiency | RVD features improves the overall plant efficiency in terms of reliability, safety and system management |
The RVD system also collects positional information for the obturator (Ball) by means of a high resolution encoder and three limit switches, two for the open and closed position and one for the partial-stroke test. This solution overcomes the inherent problems with traditional position measuring methods, RVD takes the angular signal directly from the obturator and not from the actuator. In this way the operator can be assured of the exact position of the obturator within the pipe bore, independently from mechanical gaps and torsional deformation of the drive chain. The RVD data and actuator data can be compared indicating any torque drive issues before the transmission linkage fails.
Another feature of this design is the flexibility it offers for the inclusion of additional sensors, such as thermocouples to monitor the fluid temperature. Other ports are also available including additional types of process monitoring sensors, such as gyroscopes, ac-celerometers and microphones to detect shocks, excessive vibrations and cavitation. RVD provides our customers with the most advanced and accurate live monitoring system for all those applications in which the valve integrity is a primary requirement for the plant. RVD is highly recommended for critical valve applications such as isolation, emergency shut-down, HIPPS and other similar critical applications.
RVD system is equipped with an internal memory and a long-life battery that ensure continuous measurement and storage operation. In the case of valve malfunction, RVD can send out an alarm. The communication from RVD to the operator can follow the most usual standards in the Oil&Gas industry, such as HART, MODBUS, PROFIBUS, FIELDBUS, etc. Bluetooth, USB and Ethernet communication modules can be also used to run a proprietary software that monitors the valve status in real time.
