NORFOLK NAVAL SHIPYARD, Portsmouth, Va. –
Norfolk Naval Shipyard (NNSY) is assisting Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and Intermediate Maintenance Facility (PSNS & IMF) in changing its hydrolancing process to make it safer for operators. As conducted by the NNSY’s Boilermaker Shop (x. 41), hydrolancing provides a thorough and environmentally sound method for cleaning aircraft carrier condensers, heat exchangers, boiler tubes, tow arrays and other components using a high-pressure water system.
How high pressure? Depending the component, it can be anywhere from 4,000 to 10,000 pounds-per-square-inch (psi). If that still doesn’t mean much to you, let’s just say an operator could sever a limb if this process is not executed correctly.
Shop 41 subject matter expert Anthony Britton from describes hydrolancing as removing “soft scale” from shipboard components. “In heat exchangers, soft scale would be algae, biofilm, mussels, organic matter and insoluble salts on the internal surfaces of heat exchangers before the tube dries,” he said. “In boilers it’s deposits from silica and other contaminants found in boiler water that forms on the internal surfaces of heat-absorbing components like boiler tubes and drums, and can cause an increased temperature on the metal, resulting in failure of the pressure parts, mostly boiler tubes, because of overheating.”
So while hydrolancing can be hazardous, it’s also clearly critical to the Navy’s ships and their ability to conduct their missions. In effort to prevent injury, NNSY’s Boilermaker Shop (x. 41) implemented a process several years ago where water jetting is performed away from the operator. To provide better visibility on this process so PSNS & IMF can work to implement, hydrolancing subject matter expert Anthony Britton will be traveling to Bremerton, Washington in the near future to demonstrate ways to safely hydrolance. “I traveled to Puget in January to show them how we roll reboiler tubes and bell them without damaging the tubes, and in February to a Value Stream Analysis (VSA) hosted by PSNS & IMF to discuss current process and to create a future state process,” Britton said. “It’s in the works for me to travel to Puget again to demonstrate how our equipment works, our process and what safety precautions we take.”
In the NAVSEA Campaign Plan to Expand the Advantage 2.0, NAVSEA Commander Vice Admiral Tom Moore challenged the enterprise to create a high velocity learning environment engaged in collaboration and knowledge sharing. According to the Campaign Plan, such an environment “allows people to collaborate across organizational and geographic boundaries to identify root causes of issues, solve them, and proactively share solutions and lessons learned across the enterprise.”
Britton added that additional safeguards for shipyard employees involved in hydrolancing includes “a water jet course, a Standard Operating Procedure and last month we had JetStream out of Houston come to talk about safety and operation of the two newest machines purchased. These two new machines were designed and built for Shop 41 by JetStream . Also, personnel from Naval Surface Warfare Center, Philadelphia came down to qualify some of the shop members on operation of the new machines.”
The shipyard Boilermaker Shop has been at the forefront in NNSY work safety in 2019, having already won back-to-back safety flags in the first three months of the year. The shop attributed this recognition to a family-minded atmosphere with employees looking out for one another on the job, a quality shop leaders are happy to share with members of the NAVSEA family 3,000 miles away.