Investment Proving Worthwhile for Subsea Clamp Manufacturer

Investments made over the last 18 months at a Lincolnshire based engineering firm are starting to produce dividends.

Destec Engineering, who are an original equipment manufacturer of mechanical clamp connectors supplying to the Oil, Gas and Power industries, invested heavily in a factory extension to create space for additional machinery. Destec invested in new state of the art CNC machinery to meet the demanding needs of its customer base.

Ben Vincent, Sales and Marketing Manager stated, “With customer requirements changing all the time, it was clear we needed to invest. The only way to accommodate the new machinery was to extend the factory to create a further 20–25% of much needed space.”

“The GSB Single Bolt connectors are now being produced in similar quantities as the standard G-Range 4 bolt connectors which meant that some additional large machines were needed for the fleet. We now have a number of machines with tables that can machine up to 2m in Diameter. This is particularly important for our heavy duty single bolted clamps that are designed for harsh subsea environments.”

With the onset of covid and future uncertainty there was some risk attached with this investment, but it has proved to be the correct decision as Destec are now able to compete for much larger projects. “As we come out of the other side of the pandemic there has been a surge in business activity and we have secured some sizeable orders,” continued Ben Vincent.

Recently, an order in July, for Destec’s Subsea clamps is their largest contract award to date. There was a lot of design work and testing undertaken to secure this multi-million-pound order which would have only been possible with the investment in additional resources. An extension to the company offices has coincided with the factory upgrade to provide the necessary measures to support the production process.

“With this increase in capacity we will gradually improve our response times to our diverse client base,” said Ben Vincent.

Destec’s GSB connectors range from 2" to 50" in the standard range, with the option of larger bespoke specials. The Subsea connectors have been used in projects all over the world in various applications including:

• Riser/Tree Connections;

• Subsea Choke Valves;

• Multiphase Flow Meters;

• Flexible Flowlines & Umbilicals;

• Rigid Jumpers and Tie in Spools;

• Pig Launcher Systems;

• Wellhead Pipeline Connections;

• Subsea Tie-In Connections Systems.