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BUSINESS UPDATE | www.bicalliance.com
Mobile cold cutting company ‘gets the job done right’
Safe-Cut
By providing professional results without compromise, Safe-Cut will take care of the work scope and work with your contracting team to get the job done right. Safe-Cut — a Mass Technology Corp. company — is a unique mobile cutting system for cutting steel plates using ultra-high pressure (UHP) water designed specifically for cutting storage tank floors, roofs and side shell (petroleum storage tanks). It is the only contractor in North America that offers storage tank water jet cutting services using the patented RAGWORM® robotic system developed by Jet Set Hydro Technics B.V. of the Netherlands. There are many advantages of using Safe-Cut when compared to conventional cutting means. One benefit is that the cold cutting process reduces the risk of fire. Another is that the process generates no noxious fumes, so other repair work inside the tank can continue without interruption. Finally, the system is not labor intensive but gets the job done faster than conventional methods. Since Safe-Cut uses proven RAGWORM technology, the system and methods have been patented worldwide and used by regional and international downstream petroleum and chemical sector companies. Water jet cutting has been around for a long time and is widely recognized as a safe alternative, but until the introduction of this technology the methods had been slow and labor intensive. Recently, Safe-Cut acquired a second Jet Edge-powered RAGWORM robotic water jet cutting system to meet a growing demand for its services. Jimmy Wolford, Safe-Cut’s vice president of operations, said his company’s business has been booming since it first started offering mobile water jet cutting with the RAGWORM system in 2007. “People in the industry have been very impressed,” Wolford said. “Their response to the system is that it is the best they have ever seen and they all say ‘Why haven’t we been doing this before?’”
Changing the rules
Safe-Cut’s mobile cutters are highly automated and feature single or dual cutters that can cut either straight or curved sections. The cutters, pumps, hoses and reels are all configured to facilitate rapid setup and rig-down. The individual cutting nozzles can cut through .25-inch plate at speeds up to 2.5 feet per minute in real-world working conditions. With mobile cutters capable of operating up to three cutting nozzles simultaneously, the system can churn out as much as 7.5 feet per minute of cut plate, cut through multiple layers in one pass and there is no need to remove fiberglass or epoxy coatings prior to cutting. The mobile cutters move under hydraulic power, and are tracked, fully steerable and bi-directional. That means the systems spend less time getting lined up for a cut and more time doing real work. The result is a complete, clean and straight cut that is not jagged, uneven or partially cut as handheld water jet cutters are prone to be. Similarly, the level of noise, water run-off and spray are greatly reduced when compared to traditional handheld water jet cutters. Although Safe-Cut’s focus is on storage tank bottoms, the system comes with alternate configurations to also cut storage tank roofs and walls. Other applications of the mobile UHP water jet cutting system include ship decks, rig and production platform decks, pontoon and barge decks, custom large section cuts and custom hazardous location cuts. Safe-Cut provides services under terms suitable for the scale of work — from daily rates for small jobs to cost per unit cut rates for larger jobs. The company also tailors quotes so that if a bottom presumed to be single thickness of plate turns out to be lapped with a second plate, you know which rates will be charged in advance. Whether the job is large or small, Safe-Cut stands ready to provide you with the best cold cutting service available to help you achieve efficient turnarounds with a focus on accident prevention and risk avoidance.