CHALLENGE: CAD met with WMD Squared and asked them to manage a project to receive DNV type approval on their control systems with CE Marking for their family of designs. The Type Approval goal was to cover 20 Gallon, 1 station manual control all the way through to 1000Gallon, 30 Station with PLC base remotes and touchscreen!
APPROACH: WMD Squared met with DNV on-site at CAD to review the non-conformances in the current Quality Control System. With that overall item in mind the system was then tackled.
In order for the equipment to receive a CE mark, all the applicable Directives were selected. This included the Machinery Directive, Pressure Equipment Directive, ATEX (Explosive Directive,), and the Low Voltage Directive. The next step in a CE marking project is to review the 1000’s of potential applicable Harmonized Standards and determine which were applicable. With WMD Squared’s experience in this area, this process is quite fast. The bulk of the work is in taking the applicable standard and applying it to the design, the manuals and the Technical Package for this project. All in all over 2000 pages of standards were reviewed and the equipment was evaluated against them.
The responsible team, consisting of shop personnel, engineering, drafting and upper management all weighed in on the risks, hazards and potential issues that the equipment contained. The list of design changes, changes to labels on the equipment and changes to the manual was created. Each of those items was individually addressed and a change was made to the overall design, manual and/or labelling.
The final Technical Package was close to 1000 pages in size and addressed all the relevant standards, creating a template for CAD to manufacture CE Certified BOP Control Systems, without having DNV inspect and approve each build. This is the main benefit of type approval, reducing the design cycle time.
IMPACT: CAD Received Type Approval from DNV on this equipment, allowing them to produce units that were CE marked, without submitted each unit to the DNV for approval. CAD Control Systems was the first company in the world to receive this certification for this equipment. This meant that they could easily compete in the overseas market which was very strong in 2009, giving them the technical edge over their competitors.