Sealing and containment technology requires the combination of a wide range of disciplines, The advantages of executing your research at BHRSolutions' include:

• Access to acknowledged world experts used to working to industrial priorities
• A reference database of over twenty years of sealing development projects
• A multidisciplinary team with practical experience covering engineering, tribology, materials science, chemistry, fluids dynamics and mechanics
• An established academic network
• Integration of your site/experiential data into the project
• Access to extensive test, simulation and measurement capabilities

Some of the projects we have tackled recently are listed below, but please contact us for more details, or if you are interested in a different aspect of sealing and containment.

Examples of our Research

New! Permeation of Plastic Pipelines
Government policies are encouraging more redevelopment of brownfield sites, but such sites are frequently contaminated with hydrocarbons. BHRSolutions is using ELASTEQ to investigate the effects of this contamination on PE and PVC pipeline integrity.

CFD of High Speed Gas Seals
The nature of the gas film and leakage rates are crucial factors in the performance of these seals. BHRSolutions has produced CFD models allowing the virtual assessment of different face topographies and operating conditions. This work has been recognised by a prestigious award from the IMechE.

Valve Emissions Standards: Measurement and Testing
The International Standards Organisation (ISO) is currently developing a standard to provide a common agreed basis for qualifying and production testing industrial valves against leak-tightness performance criteria. BHRSolutions co-ordinated a project that set out to clarify the underlying technical issues and provide authoritative data to guide ISO, the valve industry and the end-user community. The report is now available.

Modelling of Decompression in Elastomeric Systems Decompression of a high pressure gas system can cause failure of elastomeric components. Failure is often insidious and progressive taking the form of cracks, blisters and gross deformations, or in some cases producing immediate catastrophic fragmentation and severe leakage. Failure leads to emissions of high pressure explosive gases and has replacement costs and safety implications far beyond the cost of the seal. The MODES consortium project researches the mechanisms of explosive decompression failure, its prediction and prevention. The project has produced, and is continuing to develop, validated software to predict explosive decompression failure.

ELASTEQ
Our ELASTEQ software (Elastomer Lifecycle Assessment Software Techniques) is the result of many years of collaborative research into elastomer life under different conditions. The software is now in active use solving industrial problems.

Oil Well Sub-Surface Safety Valves (SSSV)
Work in SSSV design and failure modes have culminated in a reliable procedure for testing these critical components, together with a test service using our unique test rig or building rigs for your site.

Rocket Turbopumps
A number of European Space Agency projects have covered tribology, seal materials and coatings, seal modelling and design for high speed, cryogenic and high temperature environments.