Gas Processing Plant, Repairs to

Generator Exciters
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Project Summary Project Value: £60,000

Service: Repair and Refurbishment
Duration: 4 Months

Background Quartzelec had the opportunity to work with a gas processing and transmission
plant. Natural gas is processed before being piped into the pipeline network,
delivering gas to customers in the power, industrial and commercial sectors
throughout Peninsular and East Malaysia. The company has recently evolved
to include the generation of electricity and have developed a 300 MW gas
power plant in Kimanis to meet the growing demand for electricity.

Quartzelec had been chosen to investigate and repair a major failure to one of
their nine similar bearingless rotating diode exciters. Investigation indicated that
one of the flexible connections to the rotor up-shaft leads had failed, most likely
due to the connection dovetail joint failing from tin migration within the soldered
joint. Quartzelec recommended that all the exciters should be modified to avoid
such failure.

The Project Quartzelec worked on site to refurbish the rotating diode exciter hubs by fitting
new jointless laminated connections between the current rings and the main
rotor ‘D’ leads. The rotating diode exciter is rated at 164kW, 119V, 1398 A and
3000 rev/min.

The connections were designed and manufactured at the Rugby workshop

along with a fitting kit and shipped to site for Quartzelec engineers to install.

On site, work commenced by removing the diodes and their connection straps
and extracting the current ring assembly. The exciter hub and the current ring
assembly was cleaned, the old connection leads were removed from the
current rings and the original soldered dovetail joint examined. New joinless
leads were fitted to the current rings. The exciter was re-assembled by
screwing in new insulation studs and mounting a new insulation disc over the
studs. New epoxy-glass insulation, Nomex insulation paper and epoxy resin
was used to insulate the outer current ring connection and the refurbished
current ring assembly was pressed back into the exciter hub flange. All
insulation nuts were tensioned and locked-off and the insulation resistance from
rings to hub was measured.

Over 50% of the eight exciter hubs modified showed clear signs of tin migration
and cracking to the soldered dovetail joints of the connection leads. All of the
leads were failing / would have failed leading to costly forced generator
downtime and damage to the exciters. Quartzelec supplied a solution to remove
the certain failures in a planned and relatively inexpensive manner.

To discuss your support requirements, or to find out more about our total capability in Rotating
Machines, please contact: info.uk@quartzelec.com or visit www.quartzelec.com