I just know the answer has something to do with pipes. Aside from sizing, fitting selection, and materials selection, what does a piping engineer do? From what discipline of engineering are piping engineers drawn (ie Chemical, Civil, etc)?
Does it have anything to do with piping networks like the Civils do with city water? Are there elements of mechanics involved? IE does a piping engineer consider the resultant forces of the flow within the pipe and other concerns to the mounting of the pipe? Are the elements of process control and modelling involved? Do piping engineers design corrosion protection systems (impressed, galvanic protection, etc?)?
Are piping engineers slackers, or does one need to be a mathematical wunderkinder just to keep up? Do people recognize the value that piping engineers add, or are they seen as a necessary nuisance? Are people impressed by the skill of a piping engineer? How does the length of training compare to other engineering jobs?
What sort of career arc do piping engineers have? Do people start out as a piping engineer then move on to designing other elements of a plant? Is “piping engineer” the first step in a career, or is it a career itself? Will a piping engineer be hired by a consulting company to grind out a lot of low level work that does not allow for professional growth?
Do piping engineers work outside? Do piping engineers manage people from an early stage in their careers?
If you are a piping engineer, what drew you to the career? Why are you passionate about your career?
Thanks for your help. The job ad just said “piping engineer EIT” then had a lot of boiler plate about “team players”, and “committed to success”.
My father wasn’t a piping engineer, but he worked with them a lot during his career. Mostly, in the cases he was involved with, they were involved with the design of oil refineries and other complicated chemical plants. Every seen the gazillion pipes in an oil refinery? A piping engineer is the one who designs them to be as efficient as possible.
From what discipline of engineering are piping engineers drawn (ie Chemical, Civil, etc)?
Mechanical
Are there elements of mechanics involved? IE does a piping engineer consider the resultant forces of the flow within the pipe and other concerns to the mounting of the pipe? Are the elements of process control and modelling involved?
Yes, calculating pump capacity, pressure drop, temperature drop, etc. – its what thermodynamics is about.
It is pretty tricky routing lots of pipes without them requiring lots of bends not to run into each other. They you need to put the connections in places they can be maintained, valves need access for operation and maintenance/replacement etc. You have to size the pipes correctly, and support them so they don’t fatigue, but the supports have to have enough give not break, or break the pipes when they expand/contract with temperature.
Modern Solid Modeling programs make all this much easier, but it still takes a lot of experience to do it well.
I’ve not known entry level engineers to design the placement of pipes in a complex system, but you may be routing individual pipes. I could also be off base here, as I have only worked with oilfield services companies.
At the worst, you could be doing the drudge work of checking every drawing in a 50 mile pipeline ensuring that each support is sized correctly for the pipe span and terrain.
I do a lot of mechanical frequency analysis and thermal growth analysis. You don’t have to be a mathematical wunderkind, but you will need to be methodical and accurate, and some “silly” errors like forgetting to add the weight of a valve can have multimillion dollar repercussions. As you gain experience and the confidence of your management, you get more interesting assignments like redesigning piping runs, proposing changes to fix problems you discover in your analysis.
I can’t say much about the career arc, but it seems that if you do good work and are easy to work with you can end up most anywhere in the mechanical engineering section from a start in piping engineering. Of course, the most lucrative path would likely be to work for 5 or so years in a company, then strike out on your own as a consultant. Your Risk Tolerance May Vary.
“If the best thing you can say about your design is, ‘It meets Code,’ you might as well say, ‘If I did any worse it would be illegal.’”
Entry level piping engineers learn. They will be taught specifically how the company does things, where to find information and how to operate the computer system. It will take a while before they are trusted to actually design systems.
It sounds like it is a purely mechanical engineering job, but is it the sort of mechanical engineering that mechanicals will have an advantage at? Would you suspect the company is looking for anyone who can be licensed as an engineer, or are they looking for someone who has had the mechanical engineering courses?
I ask because they have already called me in for an interview, and I am a chemical engineer. We do cover things like pump selection, pressure drop, heat transfer, etc, but only in a superficial way. After all those years of education, I don’t really know anything.
At my old job there was no such title as “piping engineer” but that’s pretty much all we engineers did, as you describe it.
IIRC, out of maybe seven engineers there were six of us Chem Es and one Mech E. So I wouldn’t get discouraged. I think both disciplines can bring something to the table for that job.
…I hated it (I busted my ass getting this degree just to be a glorified plumber?!), and got the hell out of Dodge. But if you have fun crawling around in a plant and working with pipefitters you’ll probably enjoy it. Usually pays pretty well, too.
What you just said is the difference between wisdom and smarts. Everyone’s in that same boat. It just takes some people longer to realize it, if they ever do.
Sorry, I know nothing about piping engineers but I wanted to comment on that.
If you’re a ChemE that has some experience with pump selection, pressure drop, etc., you might have a foot in the door. I have known a number of ChemE’s that were essentially piping engineers for part of their career, but in my mind that wasn’t their best use.
If I were hiring, I’d want Mechanical Engineers or possibly someone with a General Engineering degree depending on their experience or particular course-work (if it’s an entry-level position). You really need someone with a little bit of knowledge in a lot of different areas - A little fluid mechanics, a little statics, a little metallurgy, a touch of structural engineering, maybe even a little electrical.
I worked at a company like that, and I never understood it (although I think that, since the guy who was doing all the hiring was a ChemE that probably had a lot to do with it). The company was a fertilizer manufacturer, and we mostly worked on their refrigerated storage facilities for anhydrous ammonia. There were a lot of repair/maintenance-type projects that were mostly mechanical engineering, and a few projects that were more process-related, where the ChemEs could really shine. So, most of the time you had ChemEs getting bored doing MechE work, and then fighting over the process jobs when they’d come along.
I think the line of thinking is pipes=chemicals, therefore ChemEs should take care of them.
For the past few months, I’ve been compiling tables of estimates of how many man-hours it takes to do certain types of pipe work. Wanna know how long it ought to take for a guy to attach a screw-on flange to a 8" pipe with a pressure rating of 1500 lbs?
We make air separation plants. Air separation plants have boatloads of pipes. My boss has his doctorate in chemical engineering and he also has a business background. I’m not an engineer, nor do I play one on TV.
Go to http://www.eng-tips.com/ and check out some of the forums and discussions there. I’ve heard that Chemical engineers know more about ASME pressure vessel code than most Mechanicals. Don’t sweat it, you’ll be fine in that job.
“It is pretty tricky routing lots of pipes without them requiring lots of bends not to run into each other. They you need to put the connections in places they can be maintained, valves need access for operation and maintenance/replacement etc.”
This is more the job of the piping designer, not the piping engineer.
A piping engineer may write/modify the piping specifications, perform stress analysis on the piping, approve/stamp the fabrication drawings, etc., but it is the typically the piping designer who will deal with and figure out the spaghetti mess of the gazillion pipes.
Piping engineers can be, but usually aren’t piping designers (the term, ‘designers’ defined by job tasks), but a piping designer cannot be a piping engineer [1].
Paul
Piping Design Central
[1] In jurisdictions where use of the term, ‘engineer’ is regulated by law.
Air separation plants are not particularly piping-intense although fitting all the piping into the restricted space of a cold box can be challenging.
In a typical ASU cold box one only has air, nitrogen and oxygen as process fluids to contend with (all in liquid and gaseous states at relatively low pressures). On the warm side, there is also cooling water. Materials are aluminum, stainless steel (for cold) and carbon steel (for warm).
A typical refinery or chemical plant can contain dozens of process fluids at multiple extreme pressures and temperatures. It can be mind-boggling.
Paul (7 years as cold box/air separation plant and cryogenics designer, 25 more years in refining, chemical, pulp and paper, and stuff)
