Presentation :

Industrial maintenance has been using thermal cameras for a long time. Today thermography begins to supersede systematic maintenance and reduces strongly the curative maintenance. Checking electrical fittings is the most important application of thermography in the industrial field (more than 50% of use). What about building thermography ? It is used for discovering insulation defects, heat losses or simply for testing and locating heating in the ground. Mechanical thermography is also an other application that we use to check all mechanical elements (shafts, bearings, moving spares, etc...) to avoid the "breaking of machines". Our fourth application of thermography concerns industrial process. As soon as a machine implies a thermal phenomenon, it is possible to check it and to get all the parameters under control. The security aspect is not negligible. Failures of fireproof bricks in iron and steel industry, glass industry and petrochemical sites can be detected for example.

Method :

Thermal cameras scan thermal radiation. They are used for view by night, medical analysis or studies about heat propagation. Light is often associated with heat, darkness with coldness. The very hot objects emit visible rays, whereas colder objects only emit infrared rays which are invisible to the naked eye, that is why the infrared camera is used to take place of the human eye. This camera has to record information transmitted by infrared rays and then to transform them into visible pictures. Infrared cameras can scan wave-lengths between 2 and 15 mm. In opposition to classical cameras which only scan wave-lengths ranged between 0,4 and 0,8 micrometers.

Initially, the infrared cameras were used by the army for view, observation and authentication by night. Nowadays, civilians also employ them for building observation , in air strike, laser control and finally to measure heat of electrical fittings.
Infrared systems have already introduced building, electricity and petrochemical industries. They detect leaks, control air pollution, prevent fires and contribute to weather, geographical and medical analysis.

Process :

To carry out his mission, one of our four qualified camera men works with a thermal camera, one or several lenses, a battery-holder belt, a whole range of other accessories... The infra-red camera measures and transcribes the infrared rays emitted by an object through pictures . The fact that the radiation square with the surface temperature of the object makes that the camera calculates and displays this temperature according to several influence factors. The camera produces a high resolution colour picture in real time either in the integrated view-finder or on an external monitor. Thanks to a headset microphone which is bound to the camera, our camera man has the possibility to record a comment about identification, influence factors,... for each picture. The pictures can be analysed either immediately on the site itself or on a computer using a report and analysis software.

Arms of infrared thermography :

Detecting and preventing abnormal overheating and/or overheating variations which could entail :

• A damage.
• A short circuit.
• A fire start.
• An inadvertent releasing.
• A breakdown of production.
• etc...

Giving our clients the decision elements for a corrective intervention according to the plant, machines and fittings which will have been controlled.
First of all, there is a quality control to be carried out (locating of hot spots) and if malfunctions are detected, the quantification (overheating values) will allow to define the emergency degrees (risks) and the corrective interventions and/or preventive interventions if it is necessary.