Acoustic vibration sensing and control mechanism for boilers

Coal fired power plants are increasingly evolving and with the increase in population the plants now face high demand for electricity production. Coal fired plants are progressively looking for ways to improve the plant efficiency by using predictive maintenance methods which include acoustic cleaning. The research is mainly focused on Sasol Synfuels Power station which is situated in Secunda in the Mpumalanga province of South Africa. Sasol realized that the boilers are no longer performing as they should due to soot deposition on the boiler tubes, this has led to increased operating cost. This research reviews and investigates acoustics technology that can be used for boiler online monitoring and developing a method that can detect acoustic vibration induced by an acoustic horn. The theory is that acoustic horn produces sound energy that causes vibration on the boiler tubes which can be detected using acoustic vibration sensing devices and the signals can be converted into readable information through a closed loop control mechanism. Structural and modal analysis are performed which shows the stresses that the components experience under operation conditions. The modal tests have shown the maximum deformation where the components will experience the highest frequency resonance.