Scottish Water ramps up reliability with motors retrofit09 February 2010

Scottish Water says it has improved reliability on three large sludge pumps at its Laighpark waste water treatment plant since replacing ageing dc pump drive motors with high efficiency ac motors and drives from Weg.

Operations team leader Willie Lindsay explains that the motors were used on Whitehead & Poole piston ram pumps installed to transfer sludge from the site to the Shieldhall waste water treatment plant.

He says they provided the required high torque at start-up, and variable speed control. However, questions were being asked about reliability and spares, particularly in view of repeated failures of the dc controls.

So, with limited capacity for storing sludge at Laighpark, Brammer was called in, under its framework agreement for MRO components.

Brammer supplied three W21 200kW Eff1 high efficiency Weg motors and three CFW-09 frequency inverters, with the motors matched to the drives for maximum energy saving potential, as well as reliability.

Local panel builder (Aird Walker & Ralston Elec Engs), in Kilmarnock, built and installed the equipment on site in control cubicles, before moving on to commissioning, with an engineer from Weg in attendance.

Lindsay says that the new equipment has proved totally reliable. "We were impressed by the high level of technical support provided by Brammer and by Weg throughout the project - and by their excellent after sales service."

Brian Tinham

Related Companies
Brammer UK
Brevini UK Ltd

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