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Spent 6 hours fighting a stuck umbilical connector on a barge job in Galveston
Last Tuesday I had a wet connector seize up on a dive in Galveston and what should've been a 20 minute swap turned into a 6 hour fight in the sun. We tried penetrating oil, a strap wrench, and finally had to rig a come along to break it loose without wrecking the threads, and I'm still not sure we did it the right way. What's your go-to trick for a connector that's been soaking in salt water and won't budge, or should I just plan on cutting it next time?
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margaretc426h ago
Had a buddy deal with the same thing on a dock job down in Corpus last summer, and he swears by heat. Not a torch, just a heat gun worked around the fitting for a few minutes, then a sharp tap with a brass hammer to break the crust. Salt gets in the threads and welds itself in there, so the heat plus the vibration busts it loose. He said the key was going slow and not torching the seals or the housing. Once it cracked free it spun off by hand. So yeah, try heat before you go cutting, but if it's really fused on there, cutting might save you the six hours.
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