Corrosion Investigations

Corrosion Engineering Services will enhance service life, help avoid failures or assist to control environmental contamination in the following systems:

Underground Storage Tanks
Chemical Tanks
Aboveground Storage Tanks
Boilers* Pipelines
Process Systems
Basement Heating Oil Tanks
Heat Exchanges

UL 80 is just one of the many AST along with all UST's that Datanet offers full inspection services for. UL 80 Home Heating Oil Tanks can fail catastrophically leading to large subrogation. Datanet Engineering has staff who can respond quickly to incidents and ascertain the cause of failures with great success. Following the evaluation, Datanet offers expert testimony on the clients behalf.

Home heating oil tanks can leak during fuel delivery for many reasons. The weld to the lest failed when an improperly installed vent filled with rust. This caused the tank to over pressurize consequently.

Damage to this pipe (right)was detected by surficial testing only. There were no surface indications of the pipe perforations.

This pipe section to the right, is the remains of an 18" sanitary sewer destroyed by industrial wastewater.

Robotic testing equipment located the source and provided evidence for a $250,000 out of court settlement to the local utility.

Coating Services

The staff of Datanet Engineering routinely performs detailed inspections of coatings. Our services range from review of coating in a specification to quality control during the application of the coating as a third party inspection firm. Over the past twenty years, Datanet has built a reputation of being on the front line in solving many corrosion related problems directly related to coatings in an environmentally compliant and cost-effect manner.

The best coating system for a given project is not a function of the presentation skills of competing sales representatives. Determining the optimum and most cost effective coating system requires assessing the exact conditions of the structure, understanding the clients goals, and including generic specifications for specific coating systems that are available from a variety of suppliers.

The tank above has been abrasively blasted and is having the intermediate white epoxy coating applied over the green zinc rich primer

Datanet Services include:

Site Evaluation
Operating Condition Review
Coating System Selection
Specification Preparation
Bid Assistance Services
Quality Assurance Enforcement
Environmental and Worker Protection Monitoring
Containment Enclosure Design
Ventilation System Design/Testing

A new shell man way was installed on a standpipe. Datanet provided both the plans and the third party inspection services for the owner to ensure that all welds and coating work related to the tank was completed as per the project specifications

In the photo to the right, Test dollies are glued to the coating surface and then pulled off to measure the adhesive strength of the coating to the substrate. This shows how the coating is bonded to itself and the substrate

Coating Failure Investigations

Premature Coating Failures occur due to many reasons which we can determine and then present solutions for clients. There is no such thing as a perfect coating. All coating will have holiday's (pin hole imperfections) in the coatings. One of the main reasons that coatings do not last is because the surface was not prepared properly. The manufacturer may require it to be completed a certain way but that is not always followed.

These very early rusting sites (left) are on sections of the steel that were not prepared properly per the specification. Corners of beams and around bolts need to Stripe coated prior to the application of the final topcoat

Many coatings fail due to exceeding their service life. This tank below may have irreversible structural steel failures. Once the rehabilitation of the tank has begun, only then can an exact determination of the damage be ascertained.

Certain reasons can lead to coatings failure which are:

Inadequate Weather Conditions During Application
Off-Specification Paint
Poor Surface Preparation
Sub-Surface Contamination
Incorrect Coating Specified
Improper mixing of Coating
Insufficient millage application of coating