WEEK 9 finally

Finally, after 2 weks, the blogger site and blogspot.com have started working.
My last week in HLL Orai, was full of final analysis of the cooling system, along with the preparation of the final report and presentation. the report took most of tuesday and wednesday and friday morning, while as the pesentation was made on thursday. I also had my appraisal with my tutor which went off well, and i gav my final presentation on 14th July 2006, and that ended my internship at HLL Orai.
It has been quite a journey, with new learnings in technical and people management skills, along with some new knowledge on soap manufacturing in detail, and how a company like HLL works in brief.
The experience has ben a memorable one.

WEEK 8

This week was spent in the study of the DFA plan cooling system. The cooling system has been having its own share of problems due to high temperature in Orai. This week I made the design template for calculations of the DFA plant, i.e. the heat and mass transfer calculations. The template showed that there were some problems in the plant, which I reported to my project in charge. Then I had to contact the suppliers of various pumps in the plant, to get the pump curves, while in the mean time, I searched the net on information about reading the pumps. I also had to go around the plant to get the ratings of the various pumps and motors, in order to find their respective efficiency and flow rate curves. I also took readings for the DFA plant in various conditions and parameter variations, like for normal running condition, by putting 100% o flow through Barometric PHE and then through SHE, in order to find the flow rates in these conditions. The readings were tabulated for future use, and calculations showed that there was some problem in the cooling tower pumps, which gave the wrong power readings, which led to absurd results from the performance curves. The wek thus went by with data collection fom various parts of the DFA plant, and calculations fo HMT in the plant cooling system, which gave some irregularities, especially in measurement of power from the pumps and then deciphering it using the pump characteristic curves.

WEEK 7 IN HLL ORAI

Time has been flying by, and now week 7 has ended during my summer training here at Orai. This was a very eventful week for me, and for the factory as well. This week, the factory was visited by Mr. Doug Baillie, the CEO of HLL, Mr. Dhaval Buch, the ED of Supply Chain in HLL, and Mr. Jayakumar, the GM operations North in HLL. Their visit was an important one for the factory, and the entire factory had geared up to welcome the visitors, withal the charts and production data etc, which also updated and the latest versions put on. Also presentations were made to brief the CEO about the factory, its strategic location for HLL, and the production and compliance data. I had the opportunity to meet these people in the evening during the dinner, and was very impressed by the cool, calm laid back attitude of the people who among themselves manage over Rs. 12000 Crores worth of empire. On my projects side, the week began with me making a CP for the glycerine plant automation. I had already gone through the glycerine plant P & ID and had also studied and made the logics involved in the system, so I had an idea of how the system would work once it is automated and how it would benefit the company to make it a continuous process instead of the current batch mode. It would improve the steam economy and to meet the current requirements, the plant would be required to operate only 5 days a week in the continuous mode, instead of current situation of 7 days a week in batch mode, this would happen due to better evaporation rate of sweet water obtained due to instrumentation and accuracy obtained in the automated plant. On Wednesday, I was given another project, which would involve heat and mass balance on the entire cooling circuit of DFA, which included the intercooler circuit and the cooling tower circuit, as the factory had been experiencing problems with the cooling of DFA plant, which had even resulted in shutting down of DFA plant for one day in between, so my task was to analyze the cooling tower and ICW circuit and to find out the heat balance, and the possibly the reasons why the system was not working. During this week, I took the temperature readings wherever possible on the ICW circuit in various conditions, like normal running condition, in morning as well as evening, in various conditions like with the make up water on, without the make up water on, with the entire barometric water through the PHE (primary Heat Exchanger) and through the SHE etc. I was also explained the vacuum system in the DFA plant, which included the steam ejector system (dual) along with the barometric circuit, which would give the required vacuum in the system, this also involved a study of the condensable as well as the non condensable load in the system. The vacuum system uses the steam ejectors which in a way use the Bernoulli’s principle in evacuating air out of the system, i.e. the ejectors are like C-D nozzles, and when the steam passes through it, the velocity increases, and the pressure decreases, and since everything flows from high to low pressure, the gases are sucked out of the system by the ejectors, and that is how the system works.
Now this week was completed with entire set of data collection, which I had to compile, the next week would be the heat and mass balance of the system, and then analyzing the week points, and their reasons.
On the personal front, the week was again busy with work during the day, and badminton sessions at the night, which have now become a regular feature of late nights here.

WEEK 6 in HLL Orai

It is week 6 in HLL Orai factory. The first three days of the week were spent in collecting the data about packing hall and its relation with the soap manufacturing at the back end, because that would be the crux of my report which I have been told to prepare, i.e. how to reduce the mismatching of timings and production between packing hall and backend production. I found out that while packing hall which in ideal conditions should produce 60 tons of soap, corresponding to about 7.5 tons per hour of neat soap, corresponding to 100 % efficiency, but the efficiency of the system is around 85%, so we get 7.5/0.85= 8.82 tons per hour of neat soap, or 8.82*72/77= 8.25 TPH of soap noodles. But the current soap noodle manufactured by the two Mazzonis= 7.4 TPH of soap noodles. Therefore, there is very less weathering time for the soap noodles which affects the quality of the soap.
Another glitch in the current system is the small size of the current bins, so if for any maintenance or breakdown, the packing hall has to shut down for a while, the mazzonis have to be shut down too, because the bins become full in about two hours, thus reducing the efficiency of backend systems.
To counter both of these problems (that is, of small weathering time, and less efficiency in case of packing hall breakdowns), we can have a sperate storage bin, of 40-50 tons capacity, which would be used to store the noodles produced by the mazzonis, and from there, the noodles will be transported to the cascade bins at the top, which will increase the weathering time for the noodles, and will allow the mazzonis to work at full capacity 24hrs a day, 7 days a week.
The next major problem is to increase the neat soap producing capacity, which is being restricted by the BLS pump, as there the DFA being used is already in full capacity, i.e. DFA usage cannot be increased. To counter this problem, either a new BLS pump can be installed, or to increase the flow of DFA, flow meter can be used instead of using BLS, which will increase the quantity of DFA being used for producing noodles and as DFA being used increases, the noodle production increases and the plant would be more equipped to meet packing hall requirements of 6-0 tons per shift.
Another major issue to be addressed was that of temperature in the air, for that the heat exchanger being used was first descaled, as I have written in my previous post, and then the chiller water pipeline was installed in the heat exchanger to get more heat transfer, but it had not made much of an impact, the temperature came down a lot, but not to the point till where it was required to do so.
Another thing that happened during the week was the summer summit at Mumbai training centre where we were given more sessions of interaction with senior managers and R & D people, who gave us insights on how innovations are done, with what purpose and how much of a balance is required between technology and innovations. The day started with a session by Mr Anurag Mehrotra who gave us a case study on pears and its growth through the ages along with the innovations done on it. The second session was with Mr Vivek Sirohi, who told us about the innovations and the balance to be taken between technology and impact on consumers, giving us the mantra of consumer is what matters in today’s day and age.
Ms Anuradha Razdan took the third session on careers in HLL that was an introduction to growth and opportunities in HLL, and the 4th session was taken Mr Bala Agarmurthy, who told us about the packing techniques being used in HLL, with some examples. Finally we had an open session with Mr Dhaval Buch, the ED Supply Chain of HLL, discussing the pros and cons of our internships, our experiences, problems faced etc.
I also met my mentor Mr Sirohi during the summit, who discussed my projects with me and also gave his contribution on how things work in HLL, and how I should proceed in my projects along with giving me a broader picture of things in HLL.
When I came back from the summit, I started work on the glycerine plant and revised the concepts of control engineering. The project is about studying the glycerine plant and making control analysis of the three effects and the type of controllers to be used which would make the plant stable.
Thus came to an end another learning week at HLL Orai.

Week 5 in HLL

This week was another busy one for me. It started with the completion of the interim report, which in itself was quite a task. Now I had to start concentrating on the two projects along with the third one, which was the implementation, in some ways of the first one. So on Saturday I had a review meeting with my guide, to whom I had to show the entire conveying system and the places where re-routing would be required. I spent the afternoon with him and by the end of it, he seemed satisfied with my explanations. On Monday, I learned the lessons that only an actual industry can teach you, and that is breakdown. We had a total breakdown of the DG set in the factory, and since it was summers, when not much electricity is available form the government’s side, the factory came to a standstill for about 3-4 hours, resulting in a loss of production. Although there were indications throughout the week with frequent cuts that something is wrong, this is where the worst became true. On initial inspections, it was found that the power factor had increased due to high consumption and the wires were not adequately designed to take that much amount of load and coupled with the 50 degree C temperature on Monday, the got burnt. The GM of the region was called for consultation, and he suggested some changes n the system, along with more maintenance, which would make the thing work. Then I moved on to the second project, in which I made the design analysis, which consisted of the details of the various instruments that were to be used in the system, along with the various logics that were to be followed. Then I made the logic statements for the same, which would in fact determine the entire system, an example of such statement that I made was
For the Final Solution (from E3)- If (Temperature Indicator= (Bandwidth Required)) & (Pressure Indicator= (Bandwidth required)) Then (Discharge (for further Processing)= Open) & (Discharge (To Feed Tank)= Close) Else (Discharge (for further Processing)= Close) & (Discharge (To Feed Tank)= Open)

After that, I got the descaling of the heat exchanger done, which is quite an important process as far as heat exchangers and their use in the industry goes, esp. in Orai, they use cooling tower’s water in the heat exchangers which results in scales being formed on the shell side where water is operating. So the descaling is done in which the descaling tank with the chemical dissolved in water is attached to the heat exchanger and then pumped through it for around 4-5 hrs which results in all the scales getting dissolved, this resulted in bringing down the air temperature in the system by around 3.5 degree C. then I also learned another key aspect of the industry and that is budgeting where I at with the two officers with who I have had interactions and helped them and learned how budgeting is done for various quantities required, and how they are classified as “urgent�, medium and less priority actions.
Along with this I also had another interaction with my tutor who has told me prepare a project report on the entire conveying system with the bottlenecks and the suggestions required for improvements.

WEEK 4 in HLL Orai

This week was another busy one for me. It started with me getting on to the second project, i.e. the glycerine plant instrumentation project, which basically includes providing the instrumentation for sweet water plant so that the yield is increased. This plant is currently working as a batch continuous which has to be converted into a continuous plant, using instrumentation and indicators. The system has to be analysed for being stable and all the different aspects have to be taken into consideration, like if one valve has to be maintained, then how will it be done, without disturbing the entire system. I also had to make the P & I diagram which was to be according to the plant condition now, and where the various instruments will have to be placed, along with a study of the system of producing glycerine form sweet water, which basically is as follows:
The sweet water with an approximate concentration of 5% of glycerine goes to the evaporator from where it is pumped through a heat exchanger, which has steam in it on the shell side. The solution gets heated, and the water vapours start to form, which is used in the heat exchanger of the second evaporator, and that’s how the system goes on, it is a three effect system, i.e. there are three evaporators, with two of them having two heat exchangers each. From the third evaporator, the solution is taken and checked for the required temperature and pressure conditions along with concentration (to be around 88%), if that is satisfied, it goes for distillation, and the glycerine can be extracted, otherwise it is pumped back to the feed tanks, in this way the system becomes a continuous one. So various control instruments have to be provided to the plant at different points, so that the system works. Also there is a preheating system in which the condensate form the first evaporator heat exchanger is sued for preheating the sweet water solution coming in the evaporator, another way of saving energy.
Also the noodle conveying system has been progressing well. The measurements for the chiller pipeline to the heat exchanger has been taken, and the system would be put in place in the coming week, and we will get to know the effect of using chilled water, also descaling would be done for the heat exchanger. The re-routing for the cascade number 4 has also been planned, and would be done as and when the piping arrives.
Apart from all this, I also completed my interim report, for which again I had to make a survey of the entire factory and gaining knowledge about the raw materials used, the electricity consumption done, the various processes that are involved along with the pollution control measures used in the factory which was another knowledge gaining experience.
On the personal front, the week was good with more badminton and pool in the night.

WEEK 3- Some new experiences

My third week in HLL is coming to an end, and this week like others was full of new learning experiences. So on Saturday and Monday, I completed my project brief along with the suggestions, on Tuesday it was review time for the project brief, and I was told to study about the line from the back side of the conveying system, i.e. the system comprising of BLS, pan, crutcher and mazzonis at the end. So in the next three days I learned about BLS (Bran & Leubbe & Supraton) technique where the DFA, or oil blends is mixed with brine, caustic, and water. I found out the stroke length, and diameter for each of this components, and found out the capacity of the system at current settings, which comes out to be around 8-8.4 TPH for the noodles from the use of 6.5 TPH of DFA, which would produce approximately 10.2 TPH of neat soap, which would then be readied in the pan, along with quality checking, and then fed into the scrap tank, from where it is fed into the Mazzoni which would then convert it into soap noodles using vacuum drying of the neat soap. The neat soap has 32% MIV where as the soap noodles and the final soap has 15-16 % of MIV, it is in the Mazzoni through spraying and then creating vacuum that the moisture gets sucked out of the neat soap, and from there the soap noodles are conveyed using the pneumatic conveying system (which is the major bottleneck because at the current capacity, the mazzonis can produce constantly 8-8.4 TPH but because of the faulty conveying system, they are forced to run at a lower throughput, which decreases the entire system efficiency. Parallel to this current design project, I am also involved with the team to implement a few of the other changes in the conveying system like checking the efficiency of the heat exchanger, which has become quite ineffective for the air cooling, so plans are on to set up TCDs in the system for checking the accurate inlet and outlet temperature for heat exchanger and also finding out the effect of using water from the chiller for this purpose, so as to cool the air. Also the dust bags in the system are not working, so there is a need for the purging system to be correctly timed, which is not working as of now, and necessary instrumentation like timer card etc have to be ordered for the same.
On the personal front, the week has been good. I have played a lot of badminton at night in the recreational centre along with pool and nights now are becoming something to look forward to.