Monitoring apparatus

• Main Authors: Rigoberto Perez de Alejo Fortun, Piers Lambert
• Format: Patent
• Language: English
• Published: 21.06.2017
• Subjects: BLASTING; FILLING VESSELS WITH, OR DISCHARGING FROM VESSELS, COMPRESSED,LIQUEFIED, OR SOLIDIFIED GASES; FIXED-CAPACITY GAS-HOLDERS; HEATING; LIGHTING; MECHANICAL ENGINEERING; STORING OF DISTRIBUTING GASES OR LIQUIDS; VESSELS FOR CONTAINING OR STORING COMPRESSED, LIQUEFIED ORSOLIDIFIED GASES; WEAPONS

A monitoring apparatus (1) for an outlet (10a) of a vessel (10) storing gas under pressure comprises a flow control valve (21) movable to a position between a fully open position and a fully closed position to adjust a flow of gas from the outlet (10a) of the vessel (10). A valve position detector (22) is connected to the flow control valve (21) to detect the position of the flow control valve (21), an internal pressure sensor (14) to sense an internal pressure of the gas in the vessel (10) at different times, a processor (16), a memory (11) and an alarm (18). The processor (16) calculates an actual rate of change in pressure dP/dt of the gas in the vessel (10) over time from the pressure of the gas in the vessel (10) sensed by the internal pressure sensor (14) at different times, compares the actual rate of change in pressure dP/dt with an expected rate of change in pressure dP/dt stored in the memory (11) for the same position of the valve (21) as detected by the valve position detector (22) and generates an alarm signal (s) if the actual rate of change in pressure dP/dt is found to be less than a first threshold dP/dt defined in relation to the expected rate of change in pressure dP/dt which is compared with the actual rate of change in pressure dP/dt.