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Nitriding of steam turbine blades

2004

When some one is using low grade steam (wet steam) in steam turbine, it may cause erosion problem to the turbine blades. To combat this we are thinking of using some kind of nitrided layer on our turbine blades.... Here I have two questions..... Whether Nitriding will solve my problem?

And Who are the parties in India preferably near Mumbai or Hyderabad doing nitriding business.

I am a metallurgist and my organisation has a captive power plant in which we are trying to use low grade steam (wet steam 20%).

THANKS

Niraj Kumar
- Mumbai, Maharashtra, India

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2004

Hi Niraj!

May I suggest that you look at your problem from also another angle?

Irrespective of WHAT metal you use, you should still get erosion. This is due to the impact of droplets in the steam hitting the turbines.

There is a solution. You must remove the droplets in the steam..... I am reminded of LONG AGO the Babcock and Wilcox problem in Bilbao, Spain, where the steam hit the turbines at 200 °C.

They used a metal, stainless, of course, blade type eliminator, There are, I think, only two mfgrs. of these in N.America, one being in Ontario. These units are a horizontal design where gravity assists in capture/removal of the (invisible) droplets ... sometimes people use a round vertical enclosure with the blades at max.max. 45 degrees and presto, the liquid drops to the bottom. I hope that this is of some help to you.

Freeman Newton [deceased]
(It is our sad duty to advise that Freeman passed away
April 21, 2012. R.I.P. old friend).