Can GE provide services for Chinese OEM manufacturers’ equipment?

What are GE’s methods to reduce outages for Chinese OEM assets?

Keeping your plant availability rate is at the top of your priority list. At GE Steam Power, we understand that. There are various ways we can help you reduce the number of outages needed for your plant, including:

Can GE inspect Chinese OEM steam assets while the plant is running?

Yes! We have the expertise and experience to reduce the planned outage scope and duration, and help avoid forced outages through:

• A pre-outage plant visit by a GE expert includes a TG floor walk down and on-the-spot recommendations for positive interventions.
• A pre-outage DCS data analysis provides data for the last 2 years that will highlight any disturbing trends in vibrations or temperatures—and recommendations to address them.

Predictive maintenance:

While we can’t always push your outage back, we can still help get your plant back up and running as soon as possible.

GE reviews the standard scope of each outage specified by the customer or their OEM and provides recommendations for any additional/optional scope of work to fix the issues. The recommendations are based on GE’s extensive knowledge of fleet weaknesses. GE also strongly recommends the implementation of GE’s monitoring and diagnostic package, which is based on predictive concepts. Key features include:

• Spare part management
• Recommendation for both short lead and long lead spares
• Outage planning management and execution
• We can help achieve faster outage start-up on select other OEM fleets by reducing the cooling time of the steam turbine by more than 30% and reducing outage durations on select other OEM fleets by 30%.

What could be the reasons for Hydrogen (H2) being detected in stator water tank vents of Chinese OEM generators? Would you need to overhaul the generator to check for stator leakages?

Let me put my engineering hat on for this one: H2 gas in stator water means cracks in the stator bar hollow copper strands or even brazing joint cracks at the water box of the bar. In rare cases, there may be cracks in the Teflon tube of bars. If H2 venting has gone up significantly, a proactive outage must be taken immediately to prevent further costly damage and a forced outage that will stop all your production.

What is GE’s methodology for the development of spares for Chinese OEM equipment where a drawing is not available and the equipment is still running?

We have an established parts development process for Chinese OEM equipment, vast experience addressing various other OEM equipment and are familiar enough with the technologies that we don’t need to rely on drawings. 

How can GE supply Chinese OEM steam turbine and generator parts at a competitive price?

We focus on quality improvements since all re-engineered parts need to fulfill GE’s criteria, while keeping cost within acceptable limits for the customer. GE has a global vendor base and economies of scale which helps secure the best cost for spare parts regardless of OEM.

Can GE’s Generator Health Monitoring solutions be applied on Chinese OEM generators?

Yes! This is a fully integrated and modular online, remote monitoring suite available for all types of generators including those from Chinese OEMs. GE’s Generator Health Monitoring will allow continuous inspection and condition assessment as well as the earliest identification of any evolving issues. The end goal is for you to be able to implement a cost-effective condition-based generator maintenance strategy that improves outage planning and increases a power plant's reliability and availability. We have already equipped 250 other OEM generators with this predictive maintenance solution.

What are the criteria for Chinese OEM generators that can be inspected by GE robotic machines? Is there any preliminary survey information required?

It might be my engineering side, or even the little kid in me talking, but I love seeing our maintenance robot in action! The goal of these robots is to reduce unnecessary downtime by enabling inspection of generator components without removal of the rotor. Across all the outages we have performed, we have saved more than 1,500 days of downtime thanks to these technologies. And we have developed a fleet of robots to fit various types of generators including those manufactured in China. If you’re interested in this option, we will make sure to check the applicability for your own generator.

I hope you have found these questions and answers helpful. If you have any questions about your Chinese OEM fleet that weren’t answered here, please contact us today and let’s work together!

If you would like to learn more about GE’s experience helping customers with Chinese OEM steam generators and turbines you can also watch our webinar on demand.