Lined Pipe in Indiana

Indiana is the most manufacturing-intensive state in the country, and a lot of that manufacturing is hard on pipe: the largest refinery in the Midwest at Whiting, the integrated steel mills and pickling lines that make Lake County and Porter County the leading steel-producing region in the nation, pharmaceutical plants around Indianapolis, more than a dozen corn ethanol plants, and some of the biggest coal-fired generating stations in the United States. Marspec Technical Products fabricates plastic-lined pipe spools and supplies the lined fittings and valves for exactly those services, with spools shipping to Indiana from Fairhope, Alabama. Call (251) 625-4949 to talk about your line.

With more than half a century in plastic-lined piping, we have lined pipe for most of the chemistries Indiana plants run. Contact us online with an isometric or a description of the service and we will quote it.

Indiana's industrial base, from the lakefront to the Ohio River

Refining and steel in the Calumet region

The Whiting refinery on Lake Michigan runs about 435,000 barrels of crude a day, which makes it the largest refinery in the Midwest and one of the largest in the country. A refinery that size carries miles of lined-pipe service: alkylation sulfuric acid, spent caustic, amine, sour water, and the acid and caustic neutralization in a wastewater plant sized for a city. A few miles east, the integrated mills at Gary, Burns Harbor and East Chicago and the finishing plant at Portage make Northwest Indiana the largest steelmaking region in the United States, and every coil they cold-roll, galvanize or tin-plate first goes through a hydrochloric acid pickling line. Pickling means hot HCl, iron chloride rinse water, acid regeneration and fume scrubbers, and tin and chrome plating lines add sulfuric and chromic acid. PTFE- and PVDF-lined spools with PFA-lined plug valves hold up on these lines far longer than rubber-lined pipe and are easier to inspect. Electric-arc sheet mills at Butler and Crawfordsville run their own pickling and galvanizing lines.

Pharmaceuticals and fine chemicals

Indianapolis is home to one of the largest pharmaceutical manufacturing bases in the country, and Bloomington has sterile fill-finish and biologics plants. Lafayette hosts fine chemical and active ingredient manufacturing. These plants pipe solvents, acids, caustic, deionized utility water and clean-in-place chemicals, and a PTFE liner gives them a metal-free surface with the pressure rating of a steel housing.

Corn, coal, plastics and water

Indiana ranks among the top ethanol-producing states, with more than a dozen dry-grind plants and large corn wet mills at Lafayette and Hammond. Ethanol and wet milling run sulfuric acid, caustic, sulfur dioxide steep water, enzymes and CIP chemicals, and soybean crushing and biodiesel production at Claypool add methanol, sodium methylate and acid. In the southwest, the Gibson generating station runs wet limestone scrubbers with chloride-rich scrubber blowdown, and the coal gasification plant at Edwardsport handles amine and sour water. On the Ohio River, Mount Vernon hosts an engineering plastics complex and an aluminum smelter and rolling mill operate at Newburgh near Evansville, with caustic etching and acid lines. Municipal water plants from Fort Wayne to Evansville feed sodium hypochlorite, ferric chloride and fluoride every day.

What we supply to Indiana plants

Custom lined pipe spools and lined fittings from 1/2" through 12", PTFE, PVDF or polypropylene lined, in carbon steel or 304 and 316 stainless housings, with straight spools up to 20 ft and lined elbows, tees, crosses, reducers and laterals to match. Lined valves in ball, plug, butterfly, diaphragm, check and sampling patterns, flanged to bolt straight to the spools.

On the accessories side we supply lined strainers, lined expansion joints, PTFE spacers, spectacle blinds, sight glasses and solid PTFE pipe. Because an Indiana January can freeze concentrated sulfuric acid and crystallize 50 percent caustic, our temperature maintenance line of clamp-on steam heaters, electric tracing and heat-transfer compound is a regular part of outdoor lined-pipe orders from the state. For jacketed or traced service, we recommend specifying PTFE. See our other products page for vessel accessories, custom PTFE machining and fluoropolymer coating.

Specifications and testing

Our lined pipe and fittings comply with ASTM F1545 and conform dimensionally to ANSI B16.5. Lined fittings are welded to ASME B31.3 by welders certified to ASME Section IX, and every lined pipe spool and fitting is spark tested at a minimum of 10,000 volts before it leaves Fairhope. Our technical details page lists liner temperature limits, liner thicknesses, flange dimensions and torque tables.

Serving the Hoosier State

We ship lined piping to Whiting, Hammond, East Chicago, Gary, Portage, Burns Harbor, South Bend, Fort Wayne, Lafayette, Kokomo, Indianapolis, Lebanon, Bloomington, Terre Haute, Columbus, Evansville, Mount Vernon and Jeffersonville. We build custom spools in our own shop and ship them nationwide from Fairhope, Alabama. Call (251) 625-4949 or contact us online and we will quote it.

FAQ: Lined Pipe in Indiana

What lined products do you recommend for a hydrochloric acid pickling line at a Northwest Indiana steel mill?

PTFE-lined spools and fittings for the pickle tanks, rinse lines and acid regeneration return lines, with PVDF an option on cooler return lines, and PFA-lined plug or ball valves throughout. All of it in carbon steel housings with standard ANSI flanges; polypropylene-lined spools are available for acid below about 150 °F (66 °C) where a specification calls for them.

Can lined pipe handle spent caustic and alkylation acid at the Whiting refinery scale?

Yes. We fabricate PTFE- and PVDF-lined spools up to 12" and 20 ft, with liners whose vacuum rating we confirm for each size and temperature: PTFE for spent caustic, amine and strong sulfuric acid and PVDF as an option only on cooler, dilute acid, with lined strainers and spectacle blinds to go with them.

Are lined pipe and valves used in Indianapolis-area pharmaceutical plants?

They are. PTFE-lined pipe and PFA-lined diaphragm valves add no metal ions to solvents, deionized utility water or CIP chemicals and resist the full range of acids and caustic those plants use. Many of those solvents can build a static charge that pinholes a plain lining or ignites vapor, so bond and ground the spools and use anti-static PFA-AS valves; tell us if your specification calls for an anti-static liner.

Do you supply lined pipe for flue-gas scrubbers at Indiana coal plants?

We do. PVDF-lined spools within velocity limits, lined diaphragm valves and lined strainers handle chloride-laden scrubber water and gypsum lines where abrasion and low pH defeat unlined steel, with PTFE on the cleaner acid lines; rubber lining is the usual answer for the limestone slurry itself.