Monitoring cable stress a questionable investment

Mr Maurizio Bragagni, export director of European cable manufacturer Tratos Cavi SpA, tells Port Strategy that, as a member of PEMA, an industry report was brought to his attention regarding safety in ports, which showed that electrical incidents inside ports are negligible when compared with incidents in other areas.

“As far as Tratos has determined, this is a minor problem at best. However, the use of poor cable has increased the statistical incidence of accidents and this has, clearly, shortened the overall average working life of cables. Generally speaking, I don’t see the problem as being one that can be attributed to terminal technicians; they have very little influence on the working life of a cable. Having said that, a lot of experience has been lost to the industry in the last few years, as ports have made larger numbers of qualified people redundant, while mergers between companies have also exacerbated the situation, perhaps reducing the overall level of competence,” he says.

Asked what he thinks the main mistakes are that terminals make when maintaining cables, he suggests that the crucial one is not laying cables entirely out on the ground to ensure that they are straight before they are installed on the reel.

“If I were asked for advice on cable quality, I would suggest that terminals buy only known brands, since these are clearly head and shoulders above the rest and will therefore last longer and perform better,” he says.

As for the best way to make sure cables are kept at the best stress levels, Mr Bragagni says fibre optic cables easily offer the best way to keep stress at the correct levels in a cable.

“Not all existing systems are able to accurately control stress levels. But systems can be adapted over time. However, the only real way from preventing a cable from being over-stressed is to acquire stronger cables. Operators have got to lobby suppliers to produce these.”

He dismisses suggestions that another option might be to invest in stress monitoring equipment, pointing out that a cheaper solution is to use only cables built with a long working life in mind.

“Even if you do acquire monitoring equipment, there is no guarantee that you can remove unwanted stress in the cable. Many occasions when this occurs are one-offs and occur in unpredictable situations, so investing in this rare occurrences would make no sense.”

Rather than investing in monitoring equipment to control cable stress, it makes much better sense to invest in educating the people who work with the cable day in, day out, he suggests.

“Where cables are concerned, better quality and improved working life will be achieved through this type of solution, not by adding unnecessary monitoring equipment,” he says.

Cheap cabling has inherent problems, he notes, citing the example of the Port of Dubai, which did acquire some non-branded cable, only then to have problems with it.

“Some cheap cables do not even last three months in active service,” he says.