# Biggest waste of money in industrial /petro-chemical installations



## Lone Crapshooter

In your opinion what are the biggest wastes of money in industrial and petro - chemical installations. This things can be code / engineering requirements but we all have seen ways that this things get defeated. 

1 divided cable tray
2 120 volt explosion proof receptacles
3 explosion proof ends on arching tools
4 explosion proof ends on extension cords 
5 external bond wire on conduits

LC


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## 99cents

You must be new to this. Overly engineered = $$$. Enjoy the run.


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## telsa

Lone Crapshooter said:


> In your opinion what are the biggest wastes of money in industrial and petro - chemical installations. This things can be code / engineering requirements but we all have seen ways that this things get defeated.
> 
> 1 divided cable tray
> 2 120 volt explosion proof receptacles
> 3 explosion proof ends on arching tools
> 4 explosion proof ends on extension cords
> 5 external bond wire on conduits
> 
> LC


Under-engineered facilities -- blow up or burn down. 

Yes, it's been done.


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## papaotis

over engineering and blank checks


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## Big John

telsa said:


> Under-engineered facilities -- blow up or burn down.


 Yeah, I'm really having a hard time seeing the objection to careful design in hazardous environments: I'd much rather see that than companies taking shortcuts at the expense of worker safety.

Most of those requirements are written in blood; it's not like guys don't routinely die in hazardous industries.


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## micromind

Using explosion-proof motors in non-classified locations.


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## 360max




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## macmikeman

I remember the gas storage tank burning near to Otoole's bar and pub where my girlfriend was working at the time. The Otoole's sign melted right off the side of the building and it was several blocks down the road.


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## drewsserviceco

Remember Charlie? Ask him about ignoring safety designs in refineries.


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## 360max

I'd rather see something over engineered than under when it comes to life safety


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## Lone Crapshooter

I am not objecting to the use of explosion proof devices in hazardous locations. 
But how many times have we worked a shutdown and needed a electric tool gone to the tool room checked out a power tool with brushes that had a explosion proof cord end and used it a hazardous location.

LC


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## 99cents

I'm confused.


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## glen1971

Lone Crapshooter said:


> I am not objecting to the use of explosion proof devices in hazardous locations.
> But how many times have we worked a shutdown and needed a electric tool gone to the tool room checked out a power tool with brushes that had a explosion proof cord end and used it a hazardous location.
> 
> LC


I've yet to use an explosion-proof drill.. I'm sure my cordless Dewalt isn't.. But the Gas Monitoring that I use enables it to be used in that area.. 

To your original list - 120 volt x-proof receptacles and x-proof extension cords all have their place if used properly.. A 3' "cheater cord" hooked to a 100' regular extension cord is wrong on so many levels.. 

Wasteful things I've seen:
- Doing things twice because of either bad engineering, or poor workmanship.
- Poor workmanship and/or inadequate knowledge of the code will lead to rework at some point. Usually at the cost of having to purchase replacement parts, at the owner's expense..
- Wrong materials being used. Seals where they don't need to be is a big one...
- One that won't go away is some places permitting systems.. How does a 7 page permit make things safer for the same job over a 1 page permit? Both have a hazard id/task hazard/jha done on them..
- Engineering that drags their feet on simple decisions.. 
- Poor organization by a supervisor...


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## Wiresmith

under engineering
under designing
not designing for future
not enough substations
not using autotransformers
lack of planning and knowledge


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## bill39

Kinda like dividers in cable, but how about different wire duct for different voltages in control panels?


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## JRaef

We have a refinery around here that has been consistently under funded for the last 30 years, so they are always cutting corners. Every 5 years or so something goes wrong, someone gets killed, and it always comes down to lack of attention to seemingly small details.


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## MechanicalDVR

JRaef said:


> We have a refinery around here that has been consistently under funded for the last 30 years, so they are always cutting corners. Every 5 years or so something goes wrong, someone gets killed, and it always comes down to lack of attention to seemingly small details.


Seems crazy to think of a refinery being 'under funded'.


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## micromind

MechanicalDVR said:


> Seems crazy to think of a refinery being 'under funded'.


That's only the worker and infrastructure part. The executive compensation part is more than adequately funded.


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## MechanicalDVR

micromind said:


> That's only the worker and infrastructure part. The executive compensation part is more than adequately funded.


That sounds about right.


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## Wiresmith

MechanicalDVR said:


> Seems crazy to think of a refinery being 'under funded'.


just saw a local chem plant do a 180 on maintenance when the maintenance manager position changed hands, they all get pressure from corporate but some are pushovers and will be the scapegoat when something bad happens.


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## MechanicalDVR

hd13 said:


> just saw a local chem plant do a 180 on maintenance when the maintenance manager position changed hands, they all get pressure from corporate but some are pushovers and will be the scapegoat when something bad happens.


When I was working on a facility that had life safety issues going ignored often they would be caught on _*random*_ state inspections.


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## Byte

In my humble opinion two things totally waste money as personally seen by me on over 10 large industrial jobs:
1) Rework arising from bad workmanship and lack of pride. The workers who generated the rework should be the ones to rework it.
2) Engineered drawing discrepencies. Engineers cut and paste drawings and send them to site where nobody has the time to study the drawings to find something like 2C#10 teck to operate a 3-phase pump and the distance is about 700M from the E-House. And there are 6 feeds that have to be replaced.


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## mitch65

Biggest waste of of money today is the "safety" industry that really is nothing but liability shifting. They have created procedures for doing every simple task, that if followed to the letter makes it impossible to do your job in a timely, efficient manner.


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## Lone Crapshooter

Very very true.


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## Shorttime

Capricious safety inspectors. I'll save you three paragraphs of comparing and contrasting the letter of the law versus the spirit except to say that we spend a lot of time "fixing" things that have either been working safely and flawlessly for years, or "fixing" something that a previous inspector approved. Related to Mitch65's post, but our inspectors are federal.

Design and engineering by people who don't understand the problem they have been tasked to fix, or seem determined to engineer down to cost. It works for a while.....


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## sparky970

We're building a duct bank of 18000' of Ocal.


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## glen1971

To add a few more....

Ordering a brand new 480 volt MCC, exactly the same as one that was replaced on a sister site 3 years ago but not making any of the changes that were found during that install during the Shop Drawing/Specification stage and getting the same mistakes.. New MCC needs new doors and all the VFD Vector cards replaced to 120 volt from the 24 volt...

Spending a year planning a fairly easy job and having nothing to show for it but a duotang with some tabs, a cover sheet and one photocopied drawing..

Paying a flat rate for power on a site that hasn't had any need for it since 1979 (ie - nothing on that site)..


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## sparkiez

hd13 said:


> just saw a local chem plant do a 180 on maintenance when the maintenance manager position changed hands, they all get pressure from corporate but some are pushovers and will be the scapegoat when something bad happens.


I second this. I saw a maintenance department change hands and really start getting in line. If it weren't for the difficult position I was in, I would have loved to work under that man once my position changed from IT department to Maintenance department. Even with me being in IT he made time for 30 minute (almost daily) meetings to coach me on TPM, Six Sigma, Lean Manufacturing, PM, PDM, etc. I probably read 3000 pages or more and went and discussed it with him.

A good leader can really make a difference if once the bad apples are weeded out and the good vibes start trickling down.


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## Byte

glen1971 said:


> To add a few more....
> 
> Ordering a brand new 480 volt MCC, exactly the same as one that was replaced on a sister site 3 years ago but not making any of the changes that were found during that install during the Shop Drawing/Specification stage and getting the same mistakes.. New MCC needs new doors and all the VFD Vector cards replaced to 120 volt from the 24 volt...
> 
> Spending a year planning a fairly easy job and having nothing to show for it but a duotang with some tabs, a cover sheet and one photocopied drawing..
> 
> Paying a flat rate for power on a site that hasn't had any need for it since 1979 (ie - nothing on that site)..


Figures...I have worked on phase 3 of a site near Conklin, AB and they have not implemented changes and errors from phase 1 (let alone Phase 2). And they wonder WTF is costing so much? Ask document control and engineers who cannot seem to get the time to pass on valuable information.


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## gnuuser

sparkiez said:


> I second this. I saw a maintenance department change hands and really start getting in line. If it weren't for the difficult position I was in, I would have loved to work under that man once my position changed from IT department to Maintenance department. Even with me being in IT he made time for 30 minute (almost daily) meetings to coach me on TPM, Six Sigma, Lean Manufacturing, PM, PDM, etc. I probably read 3000 pages or more and went and discussed it with him.
> 
> A good leader can really make a difference *if once the bad apples are weeded out* and the good vibes start trickling down.


this is the crux of it though as it can be an almost impossible task.
our company employed a process called 5s
while the idea was good its a disaster when you have the wrong people making decisions on what to keep and what to discard.
quite often they will discard an expensive component that is hard to replace only because they are too lazy to ask anyone about it.:no:
then its common for the turds to blame others for their f**$ups


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