Godiva fire pumps for engine and static mounting are manufactured in Warwick by Hale Products Europe. The company recently experienced reliability problems with three production test rigs, driven by two 250hp and one 500hp dc drives and motors. The decision was taken to upgrade these drives. “The test rigs are critical to production output, so minimising the stoppage time between shutting the rigs down and restarting again was the highest priority”, comments Paul Fulford, Production Manager with Hale Products, on the importance of the retrofit project.
Coventry-based power transmission specialists Andantex was chosen to manage the project, which involved replacing the two 250hp test rig drives with the latest digital PLX drive modules from Sprint Electric. The third 500hp drive involved reworking the existing thyristor stack and adding the PLXD stack driver from Sprint Electric to upgrade the installation. Start Electrical Services of Kidderminster provided the specialist knowledge, along with the re-commissioning of the new drive systems. The whole re-installation was completed in one week over a bank holiday shutdown.
The test rig DC drive and motor takes the place of the normally coupled diesel engine to vary the speed of the pump and test the output flow. Phenomenal flow rates in excess of 6,500 litres of water per minute are normal for the Godiva pump. The test rig also ‘runs in’ the new pump to ensure rotating components and seals are at their optimum performance, thereby ensuring the highest quality when the customer takes delivery.