African Fusion March 2016

SAIW Member profile: Efficient Engineering

using submerged arcwelding. Thiswork is currently being done in our Phase IV workshop.” On theoil andgas side in thePhase IV workshop, the company has completed numerous Class A pressure vessels for companies including Sasol and Natref, which typically have tobemanufactured to ISO3834 Part 2 and ASME VIII, Division 1, Appendix 10 quality standards. “We recently completed a heat exchanger tube bundle project for Natref at 24MPa (240 bar),” notes Smuts. “Most of the welding for this type of work is done using gas tungsten arc welding (GTAW); autogenously for the root runs and with filler for the seal weld on the surface. We have very good welders for this work, whom we train ourselves.” Smuts explains that his team has also successfully completed a super- duplex column for Process Plant Tech- nologies (PPTech) that had to be joined to a titanium lower section, where they applied SASTEC’s special specifications for theweldingof duplex stainless steels. “Currently, in our workshop, we are busy with two very awkward finned tube bundle heat exchangers for Na- tref, which involve a lot of GTAW mirror welding.” He goes on to describe how the welders need to manufacture 585 U-bend joints per bundle, which is nearly 1 200 tube-to-tube butt welds, achievinga very lowweld repair rate – an impressive feat for mirror welding and illustrative of the training and expertise of the team. Efficient Engineering has also taken on the fabrication of five ‘bullet’ LPG storage tanks for Sunrise Energy’s new LPG import terminal being built in Sal- danha Bay. “We are now responsible for completing the five bullets and deliver- ing them to site. This entails comple- tion of fabrication, non-destructive examination (NDE), heat treatment and final assembly,” explains Van der Walt, the recently appointed MD of Efficient Engineering’s latest acquisition, Trotech Engineering, now known as Efficient Trotech. He goes on to note that, “These are the largest vessels we have ever built. At 7.5 m in diameter and 68 m between tan lines, and awall thickness of 40mm, the total empty fabricatedmass of each vessel is approximately 580 t. “Since our establishment in the 1960s, our growth and success has been built on ever improving quality stan-

lines. These include large bulk materi- als handling systems, such as stackers and reclaimers, mostly manufactured for local OEMs servicing the mining and bulk materials export industries; earth moving equipment, such as dump truck bodies, draglinebuckets andexcavators, predominantly for the mining industry; process equipment, such as reactors, heat exchangers, columns and pressure vessels, for the oil and gas industry; and, finally, modular and non-modular elec- trical substations formining operations, and PV boxes for processing energy generated in photovoltaic applications. “This last offering is a new and exciting area for us. It will allow us to generate our own IP and become a leading OEM in our own right,” explains Smuts. Notable projects Dump truck bodies, earthmoving equip- ment and related components stillmake up amajor percentage of the company’s turnover. “The smaller dump truck bod- ies and materials handling equipment is handled in our Phase I workshop, which also houses the machine shop,” says Smuts. “But most of the big buck- ets, for Komatsu 960s, for example, are fabricated in Phase II, which has six 32 t cranes. We strive to do all of thewelding on these huge buckets in the flat posi- tion, so we needed high shop cranage to turn the buckets. “This is a differentiator for us. Since adopting this approach, our weld quality has improved significantly,” he adds. “We strive to keep our welders as comfortable as possible to give them the best possible chance of producing flawless welds. “While submerged arc welding is used to fabricate the bucket floors, the majority of the welding on earthmoving equipment is done using flux-cored arc welding (FCAW).” Efficient Engineering’s current flag- ship project is for the Meerkat antennas for the Square Kilometre Array project (SKA) under construction in Sutherland in the Northern Cape of South Africa. “We received the order for the fabrica- tion and full electrical and mechanical integration of the yokes and pedestals for the first 64 Meerkat antennas,” says Smuts. “This involves fabrication of the support pedestals and the yokes to ex- tremely tight tolerances; a dimensional accuracy of 1.0 mm on a 7.0 m length is required on the pedestals, which are fabricated in 50 mm steel and joined

A bulk materials handling system being fabricated in Efficient Engineering’s Phase IV facility in Tunney, Germiston.

Efficient Engineering’s current flagship project is the fabrication and full electrical and mechanical integration of the yokes and pedestals for the first 64 Meerkat antennas for the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project. dards.We knowthis is the right approach because people come back to us time and time again,” Smuts concludes.

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March 2016

AFRICAN FUSION