Following a student apprenticeship in marine engineering, I pursued a career in heat & mass transfer – designing thermal equipment and hydraulic systems until establishing my own consulting firm.

I was first retained by the DTI for factory surveying, then for its product design and manufacturing support programmes. I have since undertaken forty-six plant design & build projects alongside fifty-three process consultancies, and completed sixteen expert witness instructions.

My CEng registration was predicated by the design and management of major projects for Alcan Aluminium in the ‘80s and ‘90s, and election to the British Design Council in 1991.

I was elected Fellow of the Institution of Plant Engineers in 1986, and Fellow of the Society of Operations Engineers fourteen years later. I am a Chartered Mechanical Engineer (MIMechE), member of the Institution of Engineering Designers (MIED), and of the UK Heat Transfer Society.

My work scope comprises technical investigation & design fault analysis, expert witness services, mathematical modelling, and engagements as a Forensic Thermal Engineer.

I have particular knowledge of heat exchangers and radiators used in pumped hydraulic systems serving the food processing, materials conversion, transport and other key industries. I have delivered many papers and reports upon thermal engineering topics, as listed below.

Air Conditioning and Refrigeration:

Aircon parameters: climate control, arena air conditioning, factory ventilation, noise and vibration.
HVACR Hardware: dehumidifiers, ductless air conditioners, acoustic doors, AHU, air handling units.
Environmental engineering: noise control, effluent handling, oil lake recovery, Legionella and ice rinks.

Boilers and Boiler Failure:

Boilers: burners, chimneys, boiler construction, boiler houses, biomass boilers, steam boilers, LPHW boilers.
Boiler failure: modal analysis, stack emissions, boiler tube failures, boiler structural failures.
Erosion Corrosion: erosion and corrosion in boilers, heat exchangers and pipework.

Food Processing:

Beverage production: carbonated drinks, soft drinks packaging.
Processes: salt making, sugar refining, ice making, steam explosion, platen heating, cartridge heating.
Operations: tunnel oven conditioning, baking, boiling, frying, cooking oil recovery.

Thermal Plant and Equipment:

Furnaces: regenerative furnaces, furnace failure, high vacuum furnaces.
Heat pumping installations: air source and ground source heating systems.
Coolers: process coolers, laboratory equipment, Peltier appliances, cooling tunnels.
Refrigeration: HGV nose mount fridge, chillers, compressors, refrigerant, cold rooms.
Radiators: heating radiators, air blast radiators, adiabatic coolers, extended surfaces.
Heaters: process heating, superheaters, fired process heaters, recuperators, calorifiers, rotary dryers, calciners.
Batch processing vessels: autoclaves, jacketed vessels, ice banks, eutectic heat stores.
White goods: fridge-freezer television appearance, electric boilers, electrical appliances.
Heat exchangers: shell & tube, plate-type (PHE), double pipe exchangers and calandria.
Heating systems: HPHW, steam, oil and thermal fluid (HTF) heating; tower block heating.
Biothermal heating: batch-fired biomass boilers, biomass boiler failure, wood-waste heating.
Heat pumps & heat pumping: ground source, GSHP, air source, ASHP, coefficient of performance.

Thermal and Chemical Processes:

Psychrometry: baking, pipeline drying and humidity control.
Electroplating: chrome plating, chromium plate, nickel plating.
Heat transfer: process design and modelling, thermal design, mechanical design.
Mass transfer: cooling towers, packed columns, gas cooling, drying, essential oils.
Thermal operations: thermal oxidation and combustion, steam condensers, flash steam.
Thermodynamics: thermodynamics laboratory, thermodynamic test rig, ships’ funnel fires.
Fluid mechanics: hydraulics, flow induced vibration, vortex-shedding, blown film extrusion.
Fuels: biodiesel, FAME, HVO, PPO, EN590, asphaltene, diesel bug, sticky diesel, particulates.
Biomass processing: digestate sterilization & biogas production, biomass heating, ligneous steam explosion.

Plant and Machinery:

Cogeneration: combined heat and power, CHP plant, power engineering.
Railway vehicles: locomotive and DMU systems test plant, steam locomotives.
Testing: gas turbine and diesel engine test plant, materials and product testing.
Manufacturing: casting, mineral milling, dyeing, materials conversion, calendaring.
Hydraulic systems: aluminium extrusion, hydraulic presses, water treatment plant.
Pumping: pump design, pumped systems, pump failure, cavitation, pump construction.
Pipework: valves, piped system design & installation, thermal insulation, balance of plant.
Product Design: design fault investigation, design for manufacture, failure mode analysis.