Project Announcement: Automated Hydro-lance Conceptual Design for Heat Exchangers

Hydro-lancing is presently accomplished manually and requires mechanics to push a water lance through each tube of a heat exchanger to remove fouling/growth. Heat exchangers on the industrial scale can contain thousands of tubes requiring hours of repetitive pushing and pulling of a lance. The shipboard environment offers a unique challenge due to the restricted workspace allowed for servicing the heat exchangers. This further aggravates the difficulty of this task requiring unnatural postures while articulating the lance.

The specific objectives of this initial effort:

• Identify the functional design requirements of an automated hydro-lance.
• Design a prototype automated hydro-lance.
• Design the test fixture for the prototype that mimics the end user environment.
• Obtain Navy approval of the prototype design and test fixture.

Those interested in participating in this initiative should contact Dana Ellis by September 14th, 2017. We encourage participation of Disadvantaged Business Enterprises (DBEs), including Minority Business Enterprises (MBEs) and Women’s Business Enterprises (WBEs).