FAILURE ANALYSIS OF TUBE INSIDE CRUDE HEATER OF CABIN TYPE WITH HORIZONTAL TUBE AND NATURAL DRAFT BURNER

• Main Author: SUDIRMAN (NIM : 23107312); Pembimbing : Dr. Ir. H. Abdurrachim, IMAN
• Format: Theses
• Language: Indonesia
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/16031
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

Direct Fired Heater Cude (DFCH) were operated on gathering stations in East Kalimantan provience has been studied. Two units DFCH A & B have the same design load capacity of 18.0 MMBTU / hr. DFCH serves to heat the liquid before it is processed further in other equipment for the separation of water and crude in the liquid. DFCH #A has been operating nearly 36 years since May 1975 and DFCH #B is the addition of new units in operation 15 years. Replacement of damage tube section should be performed every year on DFCH # A. DFCH # B is more reliable than # A, but caused of the CO level in the flue gas is higher than # A, then the efficiency DFCH #B is lower than #A. <br /> <br /> Computation was carried out using Lobo-Evans approach. The results of measurements and observations are analyzed referring to the standards of API 573 and journals. Numerical computation was developed by the author and the results were compared with FLUENTTM software. <br /> <br /> It is concluded that tubes deteroritation were resulted by exceed of tube metal temperature (TMT) due to insufficient heat transfer area on convective zone. This condition will speed up coke formation on the inside tube wall of the tube and excessive expansion of tube on the longitudinal direction that was restricted by heater wall. It is recommended to increase the pipe length in the convective zone and change the tube lay-out in the heater so the tube metal temperature (TMT) will not exceed the allowable design metal temperature (DMT) of 540oC to meet standard API STD 530 [15].