Success Stories

Bean Plant’s Waste Water Treatment Facility: Positioner Retrofit

One of the largest bean processors in the U.S. set-out to upgrade their wastewater treatment plant. Included in the upgrade were three 16” resilient seated butterfly valves used for level control. The valve manufacturer they purchased the butterfly valves from does not make a positioner, so they outsourced a low-cost positioner to be competitive in the bid process.

After installing this low-cost positioner in the plant, difficulties arose because the instrument air had a considerable amount of water in it. The positioners were not able to handle the water, especially at freezing temperatures. Unfortunately, the manufacturer of the low-cost positioner offered no spare parts to remedy the issue. In an effort to keep the plant up and running, plant maintenance installed heat lamps on each positioner to keep them above freezing and help dry them out. This had limited success and the positioners were never fully restored to working condition.

Plant maintenance contacted their local VAC stocking distributor who supplied them with three new V200E positioners the next day, complete with stainless steel mounting kits and auto drain filter regulators. The V200E positioners were installed to replace the damaged units. In addition to the positioners, the plant purchased the two recommended spare parts. In the event of future issues, they can repair the positioner in place, using only a screwdriver, and return it to original performance in minutes.
VAC V200 positioners keep your plant running by providing reliable and accurate valve positioning, along with easy maintenance and repair.

VAC Helps Sugar Producer Improve Reliability and Reduce Downtime

A large Florida-based sugar plant has been a user of the VAC V100 Positioners for many years. On a regular visit to the plant, it was mentioned that it would be useful to standardize and have more control valves to use the V100. They have many linear globe and segment ball rotary control valves on steam service. The OEM positioner for those valves is very expensive and not repairable on the valve causing excessive downtime.

The VAC distributor provided retrofit kits for each valve type/model which included linkages, fittings, and all other small parts needed to install a V100 positioner on existing valves. The distributor made sure all the necessary components were grouped under one part number to simplify the ordering process for the maintenance department. These retrofit kits make it much simpler to replace the existing positioners with the VAC V100 and take advantage of the repairability of the V100. In fact, it takes less time to install a new V100 positioner than it does to replace the OEM positioner!

Using the V100 on more valves simplifies training and maintenance. With only two spare parts, maintenance can repair a V100 positioner, on the valve and in the field in just minutes using simple tools. The reduced downtime and higher reliability of the VAC V100 positioner will improve production during periods of higher sugar demand and do it at a reduced cost to the plant!

VAC retrofit, reliability and repairability always mean reduced operating cost and downtime for you. Ask your local VAC stocking distributor how using VAC positioners on all of your control valves, regardless of brand or type, can help you have a more reliable plant and reduce costs.

Major Brewery

The brewery was having issues with a digital positioner in a very wet application. These digital units were failing at an alarming pace, because of the harsh environment that they were subjected to. The distributor in the area found out about the issues they were having and approached VAC for a solution. The V200 would be a perfect match for this application because they needed 4 to 20 mA feedback. The brewery also wanted solid conduit entries and plugs where calibration is done with the positioner. VAC understood what they were looking for and made a unit to meet their needs. The V200 was altered to have nickel plated threaded plugs for both the conduit entry and for the zero plug at the bottom of the unit. The brewery was very happy with the results and has been replacing digital units as they fail.

Construction Material Company

A construction material company in the south was tired of dealing with so many different positioners in their plant. They had numerous pinch valves that had been retrofitted with V200s. They had a lot of success with the retrofit on pinch valves they started looking into retrofitting other control valves in their plant. The “other” control valves had very expensive positioners that were failing at a fast rate on top of the fact that the user did not need all the bells and whistles that came along with the expensive positioner. Now they have one positioner for all their control valve needs by keeping in stores different cams and different spindles. This made working on positioners much easier since there is only one in the plant, and much easier on the plants budget. A win-win for the distributor who calls on them and for the end user, another success story for VAC and the V200.

Helping Manatees

On a routine sales call to the maintenance staff of a major theme park, we discovered that manatees are sensitive to variable water levels in their holding tanks. The exact numbers are not important but if the levels vary too much they can become ill. In one particular holding tank, they were having level control problems and unhealthy manatees (amazing mammals). We went underneath the tank and the underground “hallways” to find a competitors positioner that was performing quite poorly. It had been in service just a year or so but was not holding the thousands of gallons of water to the needed level accuracy (Approximately ½”). The V100E was a direct replacement and installed in two days (good local distributor had them on the shelf). We have followed up a few times on the installation and everything is still good with the now 7+year old V100E. The “network” of underground piping, controls, and details to these major theme parks are to us technical people as amazing as the above ground entertainment.

Positioners with Natural Gas

A company in the Northeastern US wants to provide a solution for supplying the area’s industry with natural gas at locations not served by pipelines. They need to operate the control valves on a mobile natural gas pressure reducing station but have no compressed air available. The solution? Power the valve actuators with the high-pressure natural gas that is readily available. VAC V200EX-GA (Gas Approved) positioners are the solution. With special construction and features, the V200 Positioners equipped with Gas Approved Explosion-Proof I/P modules allowed the customer to operate the control valves in a safe and efficient manner. The V200 and the GA I/P module are designed with provisions to allow the safe containment and disposal of the flammable natural gas as well as having internal construction designed to handle this aggressive media reliably. In addition, the Gas Approved I/P module meets the latest low emissions specifications to reduce the carbon footprint of these applications. Another example of the flexibility of the VAC V200 series positioner.

Dryer Flow Control Reliability Solved!

A food products company in Quebec, Canada uses iris type dampers to control the flow of air into fluidized bed product dryers. This equipment was originally supplied with now-obsolete analog positioners, replaced with a digital piezo valve positioner. Product quality suffered due to the instability of the system as a whole. The positioners were working overtime, noisy, and failed prematurely.

The solution? The VAC D400 with its rugged construction, poppet pneumatic relay design, and very high vibration tolerance (certified to DIN IEC 68-3-3 Class III, Mechanical vibration ≤ 1% up to 10 g and 10…80 Hz) solved the problem. The Standard Adaptive control (self-learning program) tuned out process instability, and local support from our stocking distributor assured proper installation, parameter setup for stroke time, and stroke length has improved repeatability of the airflow to the dryers to LESS than 1%. This has resulted in improved productivity and better quality finished product. The customer has plans to install the D400 on all of its dryers in the near future.

D400 on Cryogenic Valves

A VAC Distributor in the Northeast US working closely with a skid builder has specified the VAC D400 digital positioner as a standard offering on all control valves. Due to the custom nature of the skids, this can present difficulties as many different types, brands, and configurations of valves are needed. When the customer asked if VAC could supply mounting for the D400 to four different specialty valve configurations VAC answered YES!

The customer provided VAC with these special vacuum jacket insulated cryogenic valves. Each valve required a unique mounting solution as the actuators are from multiple vendors.

As an Independent Positioner company, VAC easily provided the customer and end user with the same positioner on all control valves on the skid regardless of Valve Type, Brand, or Size, minimizing spares, reducing training, and increasing productivity and uptime.
Ask VAC about improving your productivity and reducing costs with a comprehensive Valve Positioner Solution.

Aluminum Plant

The aluminum plant was using about 3 different pneumatic positioners in their plant. The distributor and VAC worked very hard with them to devise a retrofit plan so they could use the V100P in all of their different applications. The savings factor was significant, one positioner they were purchasing was over 70% of the cost of a V100P. They have been very happy with the performance of the units and the cost savings they were able to attain.

Manufacturer obsoletes a positioner forcing a plastics plant to find a replacement for 100’s of units.