When space is a commodity, pressures are high, reliability and durability are crucial, and efficiency is required across a diverse variety of pumping applications, pump experts are finding success with a distinct line of compact, high-performance multistage pumps.
“The reason we use multistage pumps is because of the diversification of applications in which they can be efficient and effective,” said John Beckley, VP of Engineered Sales at Central States Group. “We choose Xylem because of the breadth of product.”
Specifically, Beckley and other pump experts are choosing Xylem’s series of e-SV, e-SVI, and e-HM multistage pumps with proven Goulds Water Technology expertise to solve a variety of water problems for customers worldwide.
The highly-efficient internals of this family of fabricated stainless steel pumps are shared among the three product portfolios. The differences are in the applications, pressure ratings, temperature ratings, and other specifics. This product portfolio is focused on high-pressure performance rather than moving high volumes of water and it includes a wide variety of models, sizes, and configurations that can be drilled down to the specific duty points required. The pumps are hydraulically designed to be as efficient as possible and offer flexibility with a variety of different seals, pressure ranges, and temperature ranges. The entire series is highly configurable, built to order, and tailored to specific needs.
The industrial water challenges are not new, but this series of multistage pumps offers new solutions to solve water that are effectively working in the field.
To demonstrate the diversity and range of these compact-but-powerful pumps, here are some real-world examples of how they are being used to solve water problems for end users.
e-SV Vertical Multistage Pump Series
The e-SV vertical multistage pump is at the heart of Xylem’s e-SV Series. It is one of the highest efficiency multistage pumps on the market today. This fabricated vertical multistage pump is easy to install and economical to maintain. It is available with standard NEMA premium efficient motors, pre-programmed variable speed motor drives and pre-assembled booster packages.
Historically, e-SV multistage pumps perform well in applications where handling water and liquids such as glycol, oils/solvents, and more are required in industrial, municipal, commercial building services, and agricultural markets.
Application Example: Airplane De-Icing
Especially during cold weather, de-icing is an essential and required component of any flight plan. Every airline handles their own de-icing—including purchasing, storing, and applying de-icing and anti-icing fluids to their planes. Typically, the de-icing solution is a mixture of propylene glycol and water, heated to around 150 degrees, and sprayed under pressure to the wings of an aircraft.
“De-icing on airplanes is crucial, particularly in colder climates,” Beckley explained. “If you appreciate catching your next flight, de-icing matters. Everyone can relate to missing a connection due to de-icing taking too long. Also, this process often determines whether a plane can safely take off.”
Premier Deicers provides all the de-icing equipment for Southwest and United Airlines. Previously, the company used hydraulic pumps that were not specifically designed for this application.
“This is a unique application because hydraulic motors are used rather than electric motors,” Beckley said. “The pumps are mounted on the backs of trucks. Premier is the only company in the industry using the e-SV technology to de-ice airplanes.”
The multistage, stacked e-SV pump is vertical with a small footprint (only 1 foot x 1 foot). The previous technology was a horizontal pump that occupied three times that amount of space (3 feet x 3 feet x 3 feet) in the bed of a truck.
There are three key advantages to using e-SV technology to de-ice airplanes:
- Efficiency improves drastically with a big savings on horsepower.
- Serviceability is simple. The pump can be rebuilt on the truck without removing it.
- Hydraulic motors sit on top of the pump to save space and provide even more simplicity for servicing.
Application Example: Automotive Paint Shop
Great Lakes Pumps serves the automotive paint shop market with dependable, efficient Xylem e-SV pumps.
“We’ve sold the e-SV pump for a long time and are very comfortable with this proven technology,” Scott Boone of Great Lakes said. “They are dependable and have a long lifecycle.”
In an automotive paint shop, there are anywhere from 40 to 60 pumps and generally 10 to 12 of them feature a double mechanical seal, which requires a barrier fluid running through the seal chamber at all times. The low-flow, high-pressure requirements of this application are perfect for the e-SV. Due to reduced space considerations, this application is also a fit for the immersible e-SVI line.
Application Example: Boiler Feed Systems
Every plant has a boiler feed system that pumps high-temperature water from 180 to 240 degrees throughout the facility. The Xylem e-SV series of pumps can handle this kind of severe-duty high-temperature pumping under high amounts of pressure, making boiler feed systems one of the fastest growing markets for multistage pumps.
“It’s a tough application, and durability is crucial—if the pump goes down, the plant shuts down,” Beckley said. “The e-SV multistage pump offers a small footprint that is an advantage for this application. They range in horsepower from 10 to 75 pumping 200 gpm at 300 psi. The hot water is pumped throughout the plant to anywhere hot water is needed.”
Since heat is the enemy of anything mechanical or electrical, pumping high temperatures makes boiler feed systems a difficult application. The e-SV has been very successful in the boiler feed market, replacing the old technology of big heavy-duty cast iron industrial pumps. With the previous technology, maintenance was very time consuming, requiring plant shutdowns to service them. Most of these systems are redundant, thanks to the compact size of the pumps—which helps to eliminate plant downtime.
e-SVI Immersible Multistage Pump Series
The e-SVI is an energy saving, vertical multistage pump with an immersible hydraulic end that provides an ideal solution for top-mount applications. Coupled models are equipped with standard NEMA premium efficient motors and are offered in both cast iron and stainless-steel discharge versions. With flows up to 625 gpm (144 m3/h) and sizes from 1 to 92, the e-SVI meets the demands of a wide variety of applications in the industrial, OEM, and commercial building services markets. Built in Auburn, NY, the e-SVI is a powerful complement to the existing e-SV multistage pump family.
Application Example: Air Supply Houses for Automobile Plants
LaGrange, KY-based Cas-Air-Co builds air supply houses for major well known automobile plants. For a while, the company used the e-SV model, but at times the pump could run dry for this application due to piping design, affecting the mechanical seal performance. The company has switched to a vertical sump pump, which is an immersed-style pump eliminating a dry run possibility. The new immersible e-SVI has a much smaller footprint than the other vertical options, which requires smaller openings at the top of the tank.
“Cas-Air-Co was able to solve its challenges by transitioning to the new immersible e-SVI pump, which has a smaller installation hole requirement and saves significant tank space,” said Edward Adams of Great Lakes Pumps. “The e-SVI eliminates any dry run challenges because fluid is constantly available to the seal. This pump is also available with a motor-mounted variable frequency drive, there are no external components required, and the footprint is smaller.”
For this application, a vertical pump was placed on top of the tank to accommodate an above-the-plate discharge. The upgraded e-SVI pump is stainless, which is ideal for clean water applications.
The e-SVI, is a new product line for Xylem in North America expanding on the proven technology of the e-SV hydraulics. Great Lakes is leading the charge with new opportunities in applications like this one.
These pumps have been used in industrial wash applications (for example, huge dishwasher-like applications that wash engine blocks, transmission blocks, and other automobile parts). “In the past, they had much bigger flow rates with lower pressures, so vertical turbines were used,” Mike Jones of Great Lakes Pumps explained. “Over time, flow rates have decreased, and technology has improved, while pressures have continued to rise.”
Now, lower-flow, higher-pressure applications are more common, and vertical turbines are no longer the best solution.
“We feel comfortable incorporating the Goulds Water Technology e-SVI solution for this application, even though it’s relatively new to the Americas market,” Adams said. “We’ve worked with many customers using the e-SV line with great success in the automobile market, so for this application, we feel good about upgrading to the e-SVI.”
Another significant feature of the e-SVI is the drop-in feature.
“The e-SVI is plug-and-play with most existing equipment, making retrofits and upgrades an effective and efficient process with no downtime,” said Boone.
The e-SVI allows opportunities for end users to have one consistent, compact, customer solution rather than using a combination of e-SV and other vertical pumps. The NEMA motors required are standard, which is also an advantage because it decreases delivery time.
Application Example: Original Equipment Manufacturing
One Michigan-based original equipment manufacturer (OEM) is adding e-SVIs to its overall operations.
“This customer began with industrial parts washers that were manufactured in Michigan,” Boone said. “They want to replace the pumps with e-SVIs at the OEM rather than retrofitting them later. This allows us to match the required dimensions exactly, particularly with the tank depth.”
The goal is to reduce the size of the equipment in the plant while graduating to pumps with lower flows and higher pressures. It’s a simple process to substitute an e-SVI for a vertical multistage centrifugal pump because there is no need to change the engineering drawings.
Application Example: Coolant Application for Machine Tooling
When a cutting tool cuts into metal, it produces heat. To protect the equipment, a coolant is sprayed onto the tools during the machining process to produce clean edges and avoid burning the metal.
Because the e-SVI pumps are immersible with the pump placed down in the fluid, this technology is successfully used to place coolants on the tools while being machined to keep them cool.
“We have a customer who was using turbines for this application,” Beckley explained. “The tank has pumps in them, but the tank is not deep enough for turbines. Therefore, we will replace the turbines with the more compact and efficient e-SVI pumps.”
This application has three turbines with volumes ranging from 5 to 75 gpm. The previous pumps were 150 gpm pumps that had the speeds reduced to produce less volume. Replacing the turbines with six e-SVI pumps will produce a range of capacity from 5 gpm to 75 gpm and up to 100 gpm during peak demands.
“These pumps sit over the 4-foot-deep tanks and are perfect for this application, especially since the turbines required more submergence,” Beckley explained. “It’s a unique application because the e-SVI can do similar capabilities as the turbines, but it sits in a shallower tank (36 inches deep).”
e-HM Horizontal Multistage Pump Series
Designed specifically for commercial and industrial applications, the e-HM series stainless steel horizontal multistage pumps use the market-proven hydraulics of the e-SV, which helps the e-HM offer market leading efficiency. Thanks to that and the high-efficiency motor, these multistage workhorses use less pump for more performance. Motor bearing life is extended due to the standard balanced impeller, which reduces axial thrust up to by 40%. The e-HM has a 20% increase in body thickness, which enhances durability and reduces lifecycle costs. Some common applications for the e-HM include industrial washing and cleaning, food and beverage, industrial refrigeration, water treatment, and OEM custom applications.
Application Example: Heating Systems for Drilling Operations
The e-HM is a smaller, horizonal version of Xylem’s popular e-SV multistage pump. Central States Group has a successful application for Sioux Corporation, a Northern Iowa-based industrial cleaning equipment manufacturer. Sioux Corp. utilizes the e-HM to create a self-contained heating system for remote drilling sites.
“For this application, the e-HM is ideal to operate as a smaller boiler feed system,” explained Beckley. “The facility is remote and requires heat. There is a self-contained tank that uses 1 hp and 5 hp for 5-20 gpm systems. They use liquid petroleum to heat the liquid and then the pump recirculates it through the drilling equipment. It’s a unique industrial application for a smaller pump because it has the ability to handle temperatures from 140 to 200 degrees.”
How the Xylem Multistage Pump Series Solves Water Challenges
Pump service and equipment providers like Great Lakes Pump and Central States Group have found a wide range of diverse solutions for their customers by using the Xylem multistage pump series in real-world applications.
After seeing these pumps in action for their customers, Beckley, Jones, Adams, and Boone agreed that the key advantages of using Xylem’s e-SV, e-SVI, and e-HM family of multistage pumps include diversity of application, competing in new markets, compact design, drop-in replacement features, proven reliability, durability, and efficiency.
Michelle Segrest is President of Navigate Content, Inc., and has reported on the rotating equipment industry since 2008. She can be reached at michelle@navigatecontent.com. Xylem’s Josh Kingsley, Gretchen Valentino, and Doug Bergeron contributed to this report.
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