Gas Turbine Blades & Shafts

[JJAK]

I have several gas turbine blades and three rotor shafts. Pretty sure the blades are titanium alloy. No idea what the shafts are made of - big & heavy. They came out of a natural gas refinery, pretty sure they are GE Frame Three Turbine components, at least twenty five years old.

My questions are: Are these recyclable? Might they have any value? Are there alternative uses for them?

Any info, ideas, sources, etc, greatly appreciated.

 

[metengr]

We are in the midst of decommissioning one of our aged combustion turbine peaker facilities, and having heard scrap prices for metals, I would say the prices are pretty decent. The Ti alloy blades along with the rotor, which is probably a Fe/Ni/Co alloy steel, should command decent scrap value.

You have two options, which should be based on a business decision.

1. Solicit quotes from one or more metal scrap dealers to determine value.

2. If the CT has not been "run into the ground", you could obtain an independent condition assessment and determine if you could sell the items as "spare parts". There are independent combustion turbine repair organizations that like to refurbish and hold spare parts for other machines.

 

[rmw]

What country are these in, and are they new or used. It was not clear from the original post. If new, and in the USA, (I can's speak for other parts of the world.) metengr's #2 is a valid approach.

The rebuilders/refurbishers might have interest, but most end users are trying to reduce inventories to keep from paying inventory tax on stuff. Lots of great stuff made its way to the scrap yards due to this.

rmw

 

[JJAK]

These things are in South Central Alaska, came out of a natural gas refinery when they upgraded to frame 5's. No one uses frame 3's here anymore. The shafts are used but apparently in good shape but the blades are prob not usable as is, tho many might be used as individual replacement parts.

The market is very limited here - nobody buys scrap metal, instead they charge to haul it away. There are some pretty amazing things in the "boneyards" of the local refineries.

I plan to check local machine shops to see if they want the shafts. Didn't know if there might be a use or market for the titanium(?) blades.

Thanks much for the input.
JJ

 

[rmw]

Frame 3's are still used quite a little bit in the natural gas compression pipelines which string from the gulf coast to northern, and western parts of the country.

How you with what you have, and some one who has had one swarm in any of those applications would get together, is beyond me.

However, if you can find a copy of a Power or Power Engineering magazine, and they have websites, there are advertisers in those that deal in used turbines, and turbine parts. One of them might be interested in taking it off of your hands.

That is where I would go if I didn't want to have to pay someone to haul it off. Too bad you can't cash in on the international "gold rush" going on in scrap metals even as we write.

And, is it a two shaft frame 3, or a single shaft??

rmw

 

[JJAK]

They were prob used as natural gas compressors and so the compressors or any other accessories would have had their own shafts. What I have are three rotor shafts about ten+ feet long in crates, several boxes of HEAVY attachments, which I assume are intake, compression and exhaust components(?), and several pieces of blade assemblies. Exterior casings, bearings and other components are not here.

The shafts were coated with grease - no rust - and put out in the "back forty" ten to fifteen years ago and sort of forgot about, along with a bunch of other oil field and refinery scrap. Some of which is pretty neat in a worthless sort of way.

Thanks again for your input. I am off to the North Slope for a couple of weeks and I won't be able to respond to any further postings til I return. JJ

 

[yates]

To my knowledge, titanium alloy compressor blades were never used on two-shaft frame threes. The 'heavy' boxed accessories you refer to could be nozzle (turbine stator segments) which, if new, are worth quite a lot to anyone running frame threes. Since the gas turbine was running on the pipeline gas, it is very doubtful the nozzles in the turbine need replacing, which may explain why they have been stored so long. It would be a pity to scrap the new shafts. Try advertising them in Power Engineering. If you scrape the grease off the conical section of the shaft, you should be able to find a part No. to put in your ad.