TCK wire rope flaws inspection technology

 After-sale Service of TCK Wire Rope NDT productAfter-sale service of TCK product is an important process in TCK marketing system. Perfect after-sale service can enhance the loyalty of customers to make existing customers purchase TCK product repeatedly. At present, most of customers are purchasing TCK product in a trial way, if TCK product and after-sale service can win the trust from customers, the existing customers’ purchasing repeatedly will become an important part of realizing TCK sales goal.  

After-sale technical support of TCK product will be ensured by the means as follows: ⅰ.Product self-support service TCK product is equipped with self-diagnostic module that can automatically find out the problem of product and report it to the user;  

The wear-prone parts of TCK product adopt modularization design and are handy to be replaced. When self-diagnostic system finds out that some module fails or some wear-prone part is damaged, the user can replace the module. ⅱ.Professional technical support team  TCK establishes technical support telephone and professional technical support team to settle the problems arising in the process of use of product;  

If the problem of product fails to be settled by means of telephone, TCK will provide door-to-door technical support or product re-factory support;  

And moreover, to ensure customer satisfaction, TCK establishes the after-sale service system as follows:
 

Customer relation system Four value-added service commitments Customer training system

Functions and Features of TCK Remote Network Wire Rope Monitoring System  Properly select monitoring point in operation route of wire rope for designated equipment and complete real-time monitoring of maximum travel at working state;  

Transmit danger signal if encountered to equipment operation system, give an alarm and realize stoppage automatically or manually;  

System central station (central control room) can select each monitoring point to monitor in a timed or non-timed way and can realize synchronous group monitoring or multiple-step single monitoring;  

Central station can establish wireless talkback with each monitoring equipment operator;  

Central station can retrieve monitoring data and information of monitoring point at any time to control information transmission, processing, display and filing, etc.;  

Establish TCK system management specifications in accordance with requirements of safety management and effectively realize the goal of safety use management of wire rope;  

Equip TCL portable wire rope inspector in each working area; store and transport monitoring wire rope on other grounds; carry out random/patrol inspection and patrol inspection;  

Interconnect TCK portable monitoring information with central station at regular intervals and establish sub-area management file and carry out unified management and dispatching.

TCK Remote Network Wire Rope Monitoring System has the Performances and Features as Follows: 

It is a distribution fixing installable quantitative wire rope inspection system based on wireless network technology and is a high-efficiency, high-speed, reliable and handy on-line wire rope state monitoring and quantitative flaws inspection system combing TCK on-line non-destructive and quantitative wire rope inspection system with modern network technology;  

It has relatively high sensitivity and accurate inspection on wire rope’s internal and external flaws and failures, and is suitable for field, aloft work and dispersed area and is free of restriction of natural conditions, for example, coal mine, port, building site, etc.;   

Handy erection: high-sensitivity sensor, large-capacity data acquisition device and other auxiliary facilities are installed once in respective proper position, with high precision and strong practicability;  

Convenient maintenance: characterized by multi-point fixed installation, high durability, long-term free of maintenance, wireless data transmission channel, low investment, quick starting, handy operation and maintenance, low operation cost;   

High reliability and easy management: the whole system not only can provide reliable information for reference when making decisions for users but also can provide an analysis tool for experts; it is the most advanced and accurate on-line non-destructive and quantitative wire rope (cable) inspection and monitoring network system at present in the whole world;   

Strong pertinence: as for jumping and shaking to a different extent or limited translational motion existing in operation of wire rope used in hoisting equipment, the elastic setting mechanism and sliding translational motion follower are designed to ensure accurate, stable and reliable monitoring result.  

Good adaptability: full considerations are given to use environment’s temperature and humidity, strong wind and other physical environmental factors in original development design, and various weathering performance and type tests have been completed in research experiment;  

Strong compatibility: it can be easily incorporated and compatible with multifunction control system established in major equipment and important facilities used in each industry; 

General Description of Remote Control  Engineered Model of TCK Wire Rope NDT SystemTCK remote network wire rope monitoring system for major equipment is another great hi-tech achievement developed by TCK combining weak magnetic inspection technology with modern network communication technology. Such technological achievement successfully realizes real-time monitoring of on-line wire rope for major equipment and important facilities all over the world for the first time and provides reliable hi-tech guarantee for safe operation of wire rope for major equipment and important facilities.    

The wire rope for major equipment and important facilities is always regarded as “high-danger unit” and the administrative authorities pay high attention to safe operation state of wire rope all the time. Over a long period of time, the problems on safe use and operation management of wire rope are still not resolved yet due to lack of scientific and reliable inspection equipment. Therefore, the operation and use units usually increase cost and reduce working efficiency and even are at the cost of output value to ensure safe operation of wire rope. Even if so, sudden rope breakage accidents still take place sometimes. According to 15-year freight transport ropeway accident statistics and analysis by Sichuan Dukou Mining Bureau, the result shows that 90 accidents arising from breakage of wire rope took place, accounting for 16% of total accidents, which results in downtime of 734h, accounting for 24% of total downtime. Shanghai Port Bureau has ever made an analysis on 5-year machine damage accidents, and the result is that 33% are the accidents arising from breakage of wire rope. Four accidents arising from breakage of wire rope took place in Guangdong Xinsha port only in the last year, which results in a great loss.     

TCK remote network wire rope monitoring system will completely change the foregoing situation. For some important facilities and major equipment are subject to natural conditions in the field, in the high altitude or in the dispersed place, etc. the system organically combines hi-tech inspection method with modern network communication technology to realize real-time monitoring of safe operation of wire rope by means of remote inspection and control, and it is a high-efficiency, high-speed and reliable wire rope safety insurance system.  

TCK remote network wire rope monitoring system adopts wireless channel data transmission mode and makes high-sensitivity inspection device, large-capacity data acquisition device and network communication facility installed once in proper position, characterized by low investment, quick starting, easy operation and maintenance, low operation cost, high precision, strong practicability, good stability and high durability. The whole system not only can provide reliable safety guarantee for users but also can provide effective analysis tool for operation and management of equipment.  

TCK remote network wire rope monitoring system mainly consists of Magnetize Loading Device, Combination inspection Device, Data Acquisition-conversion-processing Storage Unit, Command-control Secondary Network Terminal Transceivers, Information Moding Processing Communication System, Multi-channel Staging Master Command Control center, etc. Besides completing command-operation-control type all-around monitoring of wire rope, multi-optional control system incorporation and compatible software technology are especially designed to provide reliable technical guarantee for realizing all-around safety management work of important facilities and major equipment. 

Brief Introduction to TCK Universal Portable Standard Type Wire Rope Inspection ProductTCK universal portable standard type product can meet the requirements of the majority of industries using wire rope and it is the core product of TCK, with good performances and features as follows: 

High inspection precision, strong resolution and stable performance: the sensitivity of TCK “Dou’s element” sensor is 7-25×10⁴ times higher than conventional sensors and TCK Dou’s sensor has strong resolution and can inspect wire rope’s single wire crack, welding spot, fatigue and other flaws in a quantitative way;  

Integration: TCK is integrated with state-diagnosing module, digital automatic calibrating module, “eagle-eye” inspection module, S/N quality module, flaws information fidelity module and anti-interference module, and forms unique and high-efficiency inspection ability;  

Small volume and light weight: the weight of TCK portable inspector of all models is 0.5-1.8 kg, only 1/6—1/5 of that of similar products at home and abroad; external component connection is not required when it works, for it is small and light, one person can operate it easily;   

Strong adaptability: TCK wire rope of all models suitable for various complex operating conditions is free of effect of experience, skill, temperature, speed, noise, tricking water, warped wire, oil sludge, etc.     

Easy-to-use: TCK inspection system realizes intelligent “foolish” operation; on-line card installation or off-line unlock only needs 1s and one person can operate it, and it is handier than mobile phone.

The wire rope breakage accidents that take place annually in mine, ropeway, construction, water conservancy, electric power, elevator, iron & steel, shipping, suspension cable-stayed bridge, port, hoisting and marine petroleum, etc. all over the world is horrendous and the casualties and property loss are enormous. According to the statistics by State Administration of Coal Mine Safety, 215 serious accidents arising from wire rope only in coal system took place and 223 persons were caused to be dead in such accidents during January-May 2003. The accidents arising from wire rope are basically the most principal accident type, for example: ⅰ.Coal mine industry: wire rope ranks third in accident threats, next to gas and water breaking-through accident; ⅱ.Non-coal mine industry: wire rope ranks second in accident threats;  

ⅲ.Port industry: wire rope ranks first in accident threats;  

ⅳ.Hosting industry: wire rope ranks first in accident threats; ⅴ.Ropeway industry: wire rope ranks first in accident threats. However, wire rope inspector far fails to be popularized. According to the investigation by our company on 1553 large and medium-sized coal mines and metallurgy mines at home, the number of the enterprises that have used wire rope inspector fails to reach 1%, and the reason is that conventional wire rope inspection technology has critical flaws and far fails to meet the requirements of production process.

Really and truly realizing actual flaws inspection of wire rope and making on-line and real-time inspection of wire rope become possible ——due to major breakthrough in principle, TCK inspection technology completely realizes on-line and real-time inspection on flaws of wire rope in actual motion and eliminates the critical flaws of laboratory simulated data; Extremely high sensitivity and resolution——TCK inspection system has extremely high sensitivity, 25×10⁴ times higher than that of Hall element inspector and 7.14×10⁴ times higher than that of Hall combination inspector, and can identify micro-flaws signal. And moreover, its inspection performance is excellent, and the inaccuracy of quantitative inspection is below 0.05％; one-time inspectable rate is above 98%; inspection repetition rate is above 98%; Inspecting wire rope’s fatigue flaws in a quantitative way——TCK inspection system can carry out quantitative inspection on wire rope’s internal and external wire breakage, abrasion, corrosion and fatigue and other flaws and accordingly acquire complete wire rope’s flaws information;   

TCK technology overcomes the one hundred-year problem on quantitative inspection of wire rope at one stroke, and it not only can inspect wire breakage, abrasion, corrosion and fatigue and other flaws of wire tope in an accurate and quantitative way, but also can figure out the percentage loss of effective metallic bearing cross-sectional area according to inspected data and obtain LBS (Loss of Breaking Strength), and accordingly judge residual service life of wire rope accurately, which provides effective technical guarantee for safe operation of wire rope in each industry.

Due to a major breakthrough in principle and technology, “TCK” effectively settles the technological problems puzzling the non-destructive wire rope inspection field for over one hundred years, and currently it has become the non-destructive wire rope inspection equipment with the highest sensitivity, the highest signal-noise ratio, the highest inspection decision, the lightest weigh and the most handy operation, which provides a scientific and practical inspection tool for scientifically inspecting flaws of wire rope, reliably preventing wire rope breakage accident, accurately judge service life of wire rope, effectively enhancing service efficiency of wire rope and monitoring safety state of wire rope in real time. 

TCK inspection technology realizes really and truly quantitative inspection on flaws of wire rope all over the world for the fist time and realizes a series of breakthrough in the field of wire rope inspection: Major breakthrough in inspection performance, accurately measuring quantitative relation between wire rope’s residual loading and wire rope’s flaws, i.e. accurately judging wire rope’s residual strength——TCK inspection technology can carry out quantitative inspection on LF (Localized Flaw) and quantitative measurement on LMA (Loss of Metallic Area) at the same time, accurately judge wire rope’s LBS in a quantitative way and accordingly judge actual use state of wire rope and give a disposal scheme of wire rope;  

Major breakthrough in principle, accurately acquiring magnetic field information and various flaws of wire rope——using long-time stable remanence phenomenon after wire rope is magnetized, put forward the “space magnetic field vector resultant ” principle, eliminate various magnetic “noise” interferences arising in strong magnetic inspection technology, have relatively high sensitivity and thus make timely and accurate extraction of various flaws signals of wire rope become possible;        

Realizing reliable calibration of LMA signal——By computer intelligent automatic calibration and benchmark zero adjustment technology, automatically eliminate various interferences of space magnetic field, and moreover equip with “signal fidelity module” and “anti-interference module”  and ensure the accuracy and stability of LMA inspection result.

Compared with conventional wire rope non-destructive inspector (hereinafter referred to as “Conventional Inspector”) manufactured by use of “Hall element” and “induction coil” sensor, TCK wire rope quantitative flaws inspection system (hereinafter referred to as “TCK”) has different outstanding features as follows: ⅰ.Difference in inspection principle “Strong Magnetic Flow Detector” is designed for capturing the “Magnetic Flux Leakage” (MFL) outside wire rope, i.e. to induce the “MFL Increment” caused by exterior flaw in short distance when wire rope is excited by strong magnet, amplifying via multi-level amplify circuit, processing into visible spectrum. But, wire rope is of particular structure feature, it will create unorderly and strong “Noise MFL” (Noise Field of strand wave and strand gap) when excited by strong magnet, the “MFL” from exterior small flaw and various interior flaw would be shielded by noises, no way to effectively distinguish; signal can only be captured when exterior flaw MFL reach the “peak” status; additionally, the disordered jitter running status of in-service wire rope in different working condition makes “Strong magnetic Flaw Detector” very hard to inspect, quantifying the flaw information becomes more difficult.   “TCK Weak Magnetic Flaw Detector” takes the original created “space magnetic field vector synthesis” as theoretical base, give a right of “remanence load” to wire rope through weak magnetic loading technology. Inspection is according as distribution changes of magnetic vector and magnetic energy potential in the space inside & outside the wire rope; holographically capturing magnetic field difference information caused by various exterior/interior wire rope flaws through the way of field-energy substitution, converting into flaws/flaw curve, quantitative digital table and wording evaluation conclusion via intelligent device. TCK Flaw Detector can conduct efficient quantitative inspection especially on the inevitable fatigue flaw caused by normal wire rope working process and fatigue mechanism.  ⅱ.Difference in sensor technology The sensitivity of “Conventional Inspector” sensor acquiring flaws signal of wire rope is relatively low, 20mv/T only and original signal can only be identified and analyzed after magnified ten thousands of times and even hundred thousands of times. Magnified signal is mixed with much of noise magnified synchronously with extremely similar features to the signal, so it is unavoidable to eliminate the flaws signal when the noise is eliminated. The technological obstacle that “Conventional Inspector” can not overcome arises and “Conventional Inspector” can not reliably extract authentic original flaws information from wire rope. ·   The sensitivity of “Dou’s sensor” for “TCK” is extremely high, 5ν/0.1mT, 25×10⁴ times higher than that of “Hall Element” invented by a German and still 7.14×10⁴ times higher than that of “Hall Combined Unit” sensor that has been integrated and magnified, used by American at present; it can directly extract original flaws signal from wire rope in a high-quality way, so reliable technical guarantee in inspection precision is certainly available. ⅲ.Difference in inspection method  “Strong Magnetic Flow Detector” completely uses the method of strong magnetic field excitation. The quantization of strong magnetic field excitation has obvious uncertainty, so high distortion will certainly exist in flaws signal extracted and at the same time the back-end signal multiple-stage amplification technology adopted in “Strong Magnetic Flow Detector” has obvious thermal instability (namely “Zero Drift”); and moreover, affected by vibration, shake or variance in traveling speed of the inspected wire rope, the unusual change will take place for the signal extracted. Therefore, it is inevitable to result in instability and inauthenticity of inspection result.  ·  “TCK Weak Magnetic Flow Detector” is one and only equipment inspecting flaws of wire rope by weak magnetic technology. “TCK Inspector” conduct inspection under the Residual Magnetic Field of wire rope, the inspection performance has quite high stability. The system adopts the computer intelligent automatic calibration and benchmark zero adjustment technology; also, it is equipped with “Signal Fidelity Module” and “Anti-interference Module” and other technical devices; thus, it can fully eliminate various effects of space interference magnetic field (for example, earth magnetic field), which ensures the authenticity, reliability and repeatability of original flaws signal extracted. ⅳ.Difference in inspection performance  “Strong Magnetic Flow Detector” can only carry out qualitative inspection of wire rope but can not carry out quantitative inspection precisely. The basic reason is unreliable in sensor technology. The basic technology is not broken through, so good application performance will certainly be not realized. ·  TCK Instrument has good performance inspecting wire rope. For the equivalent Loss of Efficient Metallic Cross-section Area (LMA), uncertainty of quantitative judgment is 0.5% only; “Normal-value Flaws” quantitative accuracy is above 90%, “Damaging-value Flaws” quantitative accuracy is above 95%, “limiting-value Flaws” quantitative accuracy is above 98%. ⅴ.Difference in processing mode The sensitivity of “Strong Magnetic Flow Detector” sensor is relatively low and it is difficult to identify the authenticity of information acquired, so an improvement is expected by means of computer virtual software technology. However, the authentic reliability of the inspection result which the basic information is “virtual” based on abundant uncertain factors will certainly be difficulty to rely on. ·“TCK Weak Magnetic Flow Detector” inspection system can authentically acquire flaws information that can be analyzed and processed by computer processing software to accurately judge use state of wire rope. It not only can realize the display of on-line inspection process but also can print inspection result instantly, and furthermore can complete wired and wireless information transmission and communication with PC computer and realize remote control of wire rope inspection. “TCK Flow Detector” diversity processing model is the past “Flow Detector” can not do. 

ⅵ.Difference in instrument weight ·  One of the common features of “Strong Magnetic Flow Detector” is cumbersome and heavy. Take the inspector of Φ36mm wire rope as an example, the weight is usually 12-25Kg. ·  Thanks to the great technical renovation, the weight of “TCK Weak Magnetic Flow Detector” does not exceed 2Kg. — an excellent feature of convenience and mobility in operation. ⅶ.Difference in pass-through capacity   “Strong Magnetic Flow Detector” can only work when it is very close to the surface of inspected wire rope due to its poor sensor sensitivity, and the clearance between “Conventional Inspector” and the surface of inspected wire rope is very small, so the passing through capacity is relatively poor, and in the event that the wire becomes warped, or inspected wire rope is distorted, or oil sludge on it is very thick, it may not pass through or inspection equipment may be damaged or dragged away to cause new accident.    

 “TCK Weak Magnetic Flow Detector” can realize the wider range inspection due to its extremely high sensor sensitivity, the instrument has self-unlock function, so its passing through capacity is very strong, in the event that the local of inspected wire rope has severe distortion or its surface becomes warped, “TCK” can unlock away from it safely, and it is very safe and reliable in use.  ⅷ.Difference in inspection result  

 “Strong Magnetic Flow Detector” is boosted to carry out inspection of various flaws of wire rope in a quantitative way, but in fact, it can only inspect the flaws of wire rope in a qualitative way.  Taking the wire rope safety bearing capacity inspection principle generally acknowledged internationally as inspection standard, by means of quantitative inspection of percentage loss of effective metallic bearing cross-sectional area, arising from wire rope’s internal or external breakages, abrasion, corrosion and fatigue and other flaws by use of TCK wire rope inspector, the residual bearing capacity and service life of the inspected wire rope can be evaluated correctly, which provides scientific references for safe use and reasonable upgrading of wire rope in accordance with the requirements of standards and specifications concerned; the TCK wire rope inspector is a hi-tech guarantee of effectively preventing wire rope breakage accident, properly reducing use cost of wire rope and scientifically enhancing service efficiency of wire rope.

 TCK wire rope quantitative flaws inspection system is developed under the direction of Professor Dou Yutang, an outstanding automation expert in
China and it is a great and original scientific and technological achievement in non-destructive and quantitative inspection of ferromagnetic substances.  

TCK inspection technology is in leading level internationally and it not only keeps ahead of 25-30 years compared with western developed countries such as America, Japan and Europe, but also is one and only advanced technology of carrying out non-destructive inspection of wire rope by “weak magnetic method” on the basis of research and summary of more than one hundred-year wire rope inspection technology at home and abroad.   

Such major achievement of all core technologies accomplished through independent innovation of TCK Company focuses on fully-new breakthrough in three aspects as follows:  

1. Succeeding in discovering the motion law of space magnetic field vector of wire rope and around wire rope, creatively putting forward the new theory “space magnetic field vector resultant”; 

2. Adopting the new method “weak magnetic inspection” all over the world for the first time; 

3. Succeeding in inventing Dou’s sensor with high sensibility; 

By such three great innovative achievements combining with modern electromagnetic inspection technology, microelectronic integration technology, computer intelligent technology, network communication technology, software technology and information management technology, TCK overcomes the two technological problems puzzling the world non-destructive inspection field for one hundred years:     

1. Quantitative inspection on wire breakage, abrasion, corrosion and other flaws of wire rope;   

2. Quantized inspection on on-line fatigue flaws of wire rope.