PipeWay Tools –Pigging Equipment Made in Brazil

PipeWay is also a spinoff from the Genesis Institute run by PUC University in Rio de Janeiro. PipeWay Engeneering is the only company in the Southern Hemisphere with fully national production, which manufactures and operates tools for O&G pipeline inspection, which check anomalies such as oval pipes, crushing and corrosions, contributing to avoid leakages that may cause environmental accidents and safety hazards. PipeWay entered the O&G market in 1998, when the group of researchers from the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio), by using the technology of Petrobras' Research and Development Center (CENPES), launched a tool for pipe integrity management. Today, PipeWay is rendering services throughout Brazil and almost the whole Americas (Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Columbia, Costa Rica, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela), and also providing also tools to worldwide partners. Its parent company PipeWay International has partnered with a U.S. company in order to explore the North American O&G market. One of its main products is called the Porcupine. The Porcupine is a specially developed Pig mainly used to detect and map defects in pipelines. Below is an a rundown of the Porcupine´s capabilities as specified by PipeWay. Data from the Porcupine may be compared with MFL signals from PipeWay runs or with defect tables from competitor’s surveys, on a joint by joint basis. Special software tools give it the ability for comparison with an integrated internal/external report when the runs are combined. Individually calibrated sensors provide for high precision, with resolution up to 0.004” on local wall changes. Sensors are placed in offset rings to maximize pipeline coverage. The 1/4” combined typical sensor distance provides high resolution defect detection and sizing. Detailed and precise defect mapping by Porcupine may be used by PipeWay or third party software to effectively apply Level-2 (effective area) or even Level-3 defect assessment criteria and eventually approve defects when Level-1 criteria such as ASME B31G condemns the pipeline to expensive repairs. The Porcupine also incorporates Unique Inspection for ID Defects, which is a patented product. Due to the characteristics of internal general corrosion, channeling corrosion, and general wall thinning (erosion), MFL ILI tools have limitations on detection and sizing. PipeWay’s Porcupine ILI solves that problem. Instead of no detection at wall or the detection of only deeper defects in an already corroded area, “true” internal wall mapping is obtained. Unique concepts behind tool design, analysis and data management software allow the Porcupine as a “stand alone” tool or combined with MFL modules in a single ILI tool, able to do internal and external inspection in a single passage. Sophisticated mathematics embedded in the wall search technique compensates for issues such as wall thickness variations from nominal value for both minor and major changes. This technique also deals with normal pipeline ovalities, up to 1% OD. In addition, naturally varying tool displacements from a pip´s center axis is also compensated for using the same system. Magnetic based displacement sensors measure wall position with respect to tool center, indicating both metal loss and deposits such as hard wax or scale. Tools operate the same in liquid or gas pipeline.

Claudio Paschoa