[Sneap] Turbo pump repair

[Powell E. Barber]

Hello Stephen,

Per their website, Eagle Vacuum in KY repairs Varian.  The url is:

http://www.eaglevac.com/turbo.htm

although they don't list your model as one they repair.  I've never 
used them, so can't speak to their service.  You might also 
check with Scott Walden at Turbo Vacuum.  His url is:

www.turbovacuum.com

I have used him - he's tremendously helpful.

Finally, Balzers/Pfeiffer had a technique for decontaminating their 
turbos that involved inverting the turbo into a bath of solvent.  They 
cautioned that the upper bearing remain above the level of the solvent.  
I know of no reason why this should not work for other, invertible 
turbos as well.  While it won't get all of the blades, it will address 
those with the worst contamination - assuming, of course that  bathing 
is sufficient to remove the contamination.

Did Varian not offer an exchange?  Those can usually be shipped in 
advance.

Regards,

Powell



On Tue, 23 Jun 2009, Stephen Marino wrote:

> 
> 
> 
> We have a Varian V-700HT turbo pump that needs to have its bearings 
> replaced. The pump has permanently lubricated ceramic bearings. I 
> believe it has dry lubrication - no oil or grease. We have, in the past, 
> run high currents of beam onto titanium targets loaded with tritium and 
> consequently still have some tritium in the vacuum system. Wipe samples 
> of the inlet of the pump showed 2300 dpm of tritium contamination while 
> the outlet of the pump had only 205 dpm (New York City considers an item 
> with a measurements of <1000 dpm/100cm2 to be releasable to uncontrolled 
> areas.). Simple wiping with alcohol reduced these measurements to 350 
> and 50 dpm, respectively. Unfortunately, we can't take wipe sample 
> within the pump without disassembling it even if we can decontaminate it.
> 
> Varian Vacuum will repair the pump, but it will take 6-8 weeks and cost 
> over $4k. Does anyone know of a company, other than Varian, who will 
> rebuild pumps with radioactive contamination?
> 
> Alternatively, has anyone tried decontaminating a pump without 
> dismantling it?
> 
> Steve Marino
> 
> -- 
> Stephen A. Marino
> Manager
> RARAF
> Columbia University
> P. O. Box 21/ 136 S. Broadway
> Irvington, NY  10533
> Tel.:  914-591-9244         Fax: 914-591-9405
> http://www.raraf.org/
> 
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> 


==========================================================
Powell E. Barber,  Sr. Engineer     850.644.6477 voice
Department of Nuclear Services      850.644.9848 fax
37A Collins Research Lab 
1060 Atomic Way
Florida State University
Tallahassee  FL  32306-4470

barber at nucmar.physics.fsu.edu
http://fsunuc.physics.fsu.edu/~barber/
==========================================================