Lined Pipe in Alabama

Alabama is home. Our shop sits in Fairhope, on the eastern shore of Mobile Bay. Around it is a state full of chlor-alkali cell rooms, bleach plants, pickling lines and fluoropolymer units, whose chemistry is hard on bare steel. Marspec Technical Products has lined steel pipe for more than half a century. Call (251) 625-4949, or contact us online and send the isometrics.

We fabricate PTFE-, PVDF- and polypropylene-lined spools in our own shop and supply the fittings and valves that go with them. For an Alabama plant, the spools are built in the state they will run in.

Alabama's process industries, region by region

Mobile Bay and the Tombigbee

The chemical corridor begins across the bay from us, at the Theodore Industrial Canal. It follows the Mobile and Tombigbee rivers north through Saraland, Axis and the Calvert steel mills to the McIntosh chlor-alkali plant. Phenol, hydrogen peroxide, wet chlorine, hydrochloric acid and nitric-hydrofluoric pickle acid all move through it. Our Mobile page covers the corridor plant by plant.

The Tennessee Valley

North Alabama's heaviest chemistry lines the Tennessee River at Decatur: fluoropolymers, nylon intermediates, terephthalic acid and a sheet mill that pickles its own hot band. In the Shoals, the Muscle Shoals rolling mill has capacity for over a billion pounds a year of finished coil, chiefly can body, end and tab stock. Its coated end stock needs chemical cleaning and pretreatment ahead of the coater. The Decatur and Huntsville page has the detail.

Pulp and paper

Alabama ranks second in the nation in pulp, paper and paperboard. At Perdue Hill on the Alabama River, a mill makes fluff and market pulp. Brewton makes solid bleached cartonboard and white-top linerboard. The Naheola mill in Choctaw County makes tissue, towel and bleached paperboard, and Demopolis makes bleached board for food packaging. Pine Hill, Prattville and Selma make containerboard.

In the bleached-grade mills, chlorine dioxide solution and acidic D-stage filtrate defeat stainless steel, so they go in PTFE-lined pipe. Generator sulfuric acid, caustic extraction and peroxide lines are PTFE work too, with PVDF an option on peroxide. Most pine kraft mills also split tall oil soap with sulfuric acid. Our pulp and paper page goes stage by stage.

Birmingham and Tuscaloosa

Birmingham's metals industry has changed shape rather than left. At Fairfield, U.S. Steel has an electric arc furnace that feeds its tubular operations. All three domestic ductile iron pipe makers trace their roots to Birmingham. On the Black Warrior River, Tuscaloosa's refinery of about 50,000 barrels a day runs a coker and a diesel hydrotreater.

In this belt, lined pipe carries the hydrochloric or sulfuric pickle acid and zinc ammonium chloride flux of steel finishing and galvanizing shops. A refinery adds spent caustic and sour water. See steel pickling and refineries.

Power, water and Baldwin County

Plant Miller in Jefferson County, Alabama Power's largest coal-fired plant, completed four scrubbers at a cost of $870 million. Limestone slurry usually runs in rubber-lined pipe. Lined pipe belongs on regeneration acid and caustic, scrubber wastewater chemicals and cooling-tower hypochlorite, as our power plant page explains.

Central Alabama Water, the Birmingham water utility, draws on the Cahaba River, Lake Purdy and Inland Lake. Its four filter plants include Shades Mountain at 80 million gallons a day and Western at 60. Utilities from Huntsville to Mobile feed sodium hypochlorite, coagulants, caustic and fluorosilicic acid. Closer to our shop, Bay Minette has an aluminum rolling and recycling plant built for 600,000 tons a year.

What comes out of the Fairhope shop

Spools run 1/2" through 12" and up to 20 ft long. Housings are carbon steel or 304/316 stainless with ANSI B16.5 flanges. PTFE-lined fittings in carbon and stainless steel are stocked; PVDF and polypropylene are lined to order. Fitting types and dimensions are on our lined pipe and fittings page; matching an existing system is covered on our Alabama fittings page.

Our ball, plug, butterfly, diaphragm, check and sampling valves are Swissfluid PFA- and PTFE-lined valves, stocked in Stafford, Texas, that ship from Fairhope, Alabama. We build automated valve packages in house. See lined valves and our Alabama valve page.

PTFE is the liner we recommend for most Alabama service, from chlorine dioxide to hot hydrochloric acid. Housings on chlorine, HCl and HF lines are vented, because those molecules permeate the liner. PVDF is the toughest, most abrasion-resistant of the three liners, but amines and strong caustic attack it, and we prefer PTFE for ammonia. Polypropylene is available where a specification calls for it; in a finished spool the liner is a small part of the cost.

Lined strainers, PTFE expansion joints and spacers, spectacle blinds and sight flow indicators complete the line. Alabama winters are short, but 50 percent caustic left in an idle rack on a January night in Huntsville will set up. Clamp-on steam heaters, electric tracing and heat-transfer compound prevent that; see our Alabama accessories page.

What the spec sheet says

Our lined pipe and fittings comply with ASTM F1545. Lined fittings carry identifying markings on their flanges in accordance with ASTM F1545, and fittings conform dimensionally to ANSI B16.5. The lined fittings we supply are welded to ASME B31.3 by welders certified to ASME Section IX. Every lined spool and fitting is spark tested at a minimum of 10,000 volts, and carbon steel housings are primed for field top-coating. Liner temperature limits, liner thicknesses, flange dimensions and torque tables are on our Technical Details page.

Serving Alabama from Fairhope

We build for plants in Mobile, Theodore, McIntosh, Calvert, Brewton, Perdue Hill, Demopolis, Selma, Prattville, Montgomery and Tuscaloosa. The list runs on through Birmingham, Bessemer, Dothan, Decatur, Huntsville and the Shoals. We quote a fabrication time with every order, so tell us your required date when you request a quote. Call (251) 625-4949 or contact us online.

FAQ: Lined Pipe in Alabama

Where is your shop, and what is built there?

Our shop is in Fairhope, Alabama, where we fabricate PTFE-, PVDF- and polypropylene-lined spools to your isometrics. PTFE-lined fittings are stocked, and Swissfluid PFA- and PTFE-lined valves, stocked in Stafford, Texas, ship from Fairhope, Alabama, with the pipe.

Which liner should an Alabama pulp mill use for chlorine dioxide and D-stage filtrate?

PTFE, which handles chlorine dioxide solution, its acidic filtrate and the generator's sulfuric acid where stainless steel pits. PVDF is an option on peroxide stages. Polypropylene is never used on chlorine dioxide or hypochlorite.

Can lined pipe go on the scrubber at an Alabama coal plant?

Not on the limestone slurry loop, which is abrasive and usually runs in rubber-lined pipe. Lined pipe belongs on scrubber wastewater chemicals, demineralizer regeneration acid and caustic, and hypochlorite feed.

What do you recommend for sodium hypochlorite at an Alabama water plant?

PTFE-lined pipe with lined diaphragm valves. Commercial 12.5 percent bleach carries excess caustic at about pH 12 to 13. We offer PVDF for it only when the hypochlorite is dilute or generated on site at pH 12 or below, and polypropylene not at all.