Hot Zone Repaired & Installed with Minimal Downtime

Pregl Services Inc. is here to facilitate, with their flexibility and expertise, any customers needs for their vacuum furnace equipment. This is eveident by a recent project that we took on. Pregl was contacted by a customer on Friday, the 8th of January 2016, about a graphite liner kit that was purchased by them from the OEM. Pregl was in the customers shop within 1 hour assessing the situation.

The potential customer was lacking on man-power to finish the job with minimal downtime. Pregl presented a quote that evening and the unit was delivered to the Pregl facility on Saturday the 9th. On Monday morning Pregl assigned three technicians to get the job out the door before the customers request date of Friday January 15th.

During the installation, the Pregl technicians noticed that there was not a washer around the gas nozzle ports. With the customers approval, the Pregl team engineered a Carbon Fiber washer with a Molybdenum retention pin to hold it in place. Without this critical upgrade, the customer would have exposed their brand new purchased hot zone to stresses that were simply not necessary.

The next OEM flaw was the utilization of graphoil for the outermost layer of the hot zone. The customer stated that they just wanted the back wall done. This was then engineered and cut to fit into place for simple fit up. CFC is a great way to lengthen the process life of your hot zone due to its ruggedness and great thermal properties.

Installation of the project started on Friday the 15th, when again the customer asked for Pregl’s assistance in the install. There were three service technicians onsite early Saturday morning to facilitate this. The customer was so impressed with how the CFC held up during the install that they also requested to do the front door. This was cut and secured Sunday with the completion of the install.

Photos of the repair process