The welding together of large diameter pipes at GE Oil & Gas in Montrose provided a tough design challenge for the AES team. The process involved heating the pipe ends with a large burner and then welding using an automated flux core process.

The large diamer of the pipes meant that traditional extraction arms did not have suffient capture area to remove all the fumes, and in addition, the presence of an overhead crane meant that fixed canopies could not be used.

Our solution to the problem was the design and manufacture of large canopies on boom arms. 200mm diameter ducting gave sufficient flowrate to remove the weld fume and hot gases produced during heating. Motorised dampers were fitted at each canopy so that operators could ensure that the extraction was only on when required and the fan was connected to an inverter control to ensure that runing costs were minimised.