Canadian plastics fabricator supplies huge
chemical tanks to Far East

Four Chlorine Gas Absorbers installed on site.

An international manufacturer of Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC), contracted Fabricated Plastics Limited (Fabco), to engineer, manufacture, ship and install over 30 miles of custom-made plastic (FRP) piping, lined plastic and thermoplastic tanks for the expansion of its plastics resin plant in the United States.

Fabco was later invited, along with other plastics manufacturers, worldwide, to tender for another complex project located in the Far East. This consisted of a petrochemical complex, one of 32 plants being built on a huge 12,000 acre site. The required tanks and towers, 14 of each, were destined for the chlor-alkali supply plant, specifically for the Ion Exchange Membrane system (IEM). The IEM plant produces liquid chlorine, a key ingredient of PVC plastic resin.

The plant site is located in a sensitive seismic zone so that any construction, and particularly a plant handling hazardous chemicals, had to be able to withstand earthquakes. The hydrostatic loads this equipment had to accommodate were particularly high too, so that great strength and integrity were imperative. The challenge then, was to maximize the amount of fusion machine welding of thermoplastic lining and to armour the equipment by the filament winding process.

Armourplastics, the registered trade name for Fabco's construction of thermoplastic, armoured with fiberglass, was chosen for the construction material.

It is believed that no project ever before had included this number of oversize tanks, using super-strength specifications, or this total poundage of material. The details of the engineering required exploring previously uncharted territory including computer-aided laminate design and stress analyses of laminate layers. ASME RTP-1 design methods were followed.

A special permit was sought and granted by the Department of Transport to truck the finished materials to a shipyard on the St. Lawrence Seaway. In Ontario, December temperatures can easily drop into the minus twenties Celsius, hardly the best conditions for the final assembly of the equipment.

Temporary buildings were erected that allowed a system of heat control. Inside these buildings the tanks were assembled and made ready for loading onto the ship. This required using a massive construction crane to lift the tops onto the centre sections. Continuous welding sealed the PVC liner, followed by a complete fiberglass seam to seal the exterior armour coating.

Sodium Hypochlorite tanks being loaded to beat Seaway closing.

Once the ship arrived in the Far East, many of the tanks could be lowered directly into their final positions. The rest were transported and lowered into position by construction cranes. During the remainder of the winter of 1997/98, the final pieces were fabricated and shipped out on the first ship leaving the Seaway in the Spring of 1998. Subsequently, Fabco installation experts completed their task and the entire plant, virtually a turn key operation, was successfully test run.

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