Prosafe Production have been concerned about the build up of marine growth on their turret disconnect mechanism on their FPSO’s but were unable to find a cost effective solution until they consider coating the components in copper nickel using metalizing / thermal spray. Prosafe contracted MTM Metalizing to coat the turret latching elements with 90/10 Cu/Ni. The components were blasted and metalized with a minimum of 250 microns (10mils) of copper/ nickel. This thickness will ensure that the components will repel the marine growth and ensure the components remain protected in spite of being immersed in seawater.

MTM Metalizing is one of the few companies that are capable of using twin wire arc spray to thermally spray copper nickel wire to this thickness due to the high energy required to melt the copper nickel wire. Our equipment had no problems melting the wire and providing a low porosity high strength coating.

While they were having the copper nickel coating applied, Prosafe also had components coated in aluminium for enhanced corrosion protection on the FPSO above water. While TSA (Thermally Sprayed Aluminium) costs more when compared to a single application of paint, in the long run it more than pays for itself as the coating will provide a coating life in excess of twenty years, and is resistant to damage, including installation and handling damage.