High-pressure technologies from Hagen for the world – for 80 years now

Uhde High Pressure Technologies is a well-established company with a long tradition – and in July 2010 we celebrate our 80^th anniversary!

It all started at a coal mine in Herne in the Ruhr Valley where Friedrich Uhde GmbH erected its first plant for ammonia synthesis.The incidental coke oven gas was meant to serve as process gas. First of all, Mr. Uhde expanded a workshop on the site of a coal mine in Herne for the fabrication of the required high-pressure equipment. By entry in the commercial register of Dortmund on July 22, 1930 the workshop evolved into the company Hochdruck-Apparatebau GmbH which soon moved its headquarters to Hagen on the outskirts of the Ruhr Valley.

Within only a few years Uhde Hochdruck-Apparatebau was able to make a name for itself in this special field and as early as in the mid thirties the company supplied high-pressure vessels, valves and pumps into the whole world. In most cases the equipment was used for ammonia synthesis or for various hydrogenation processes.

In the fifties the most important field of activity of Uhde Hagen developed: the large-scale industrial production of polyethylene at high pressures of up to 3,600 bar. Uhde supplied the complete process equipment of the plant as well as high-pressure pilot plants used to further the development of the process. In the year 1952 Uhde was taken over by the Hoechst group in Frankfurt which also manufactured and operated polyethylene plants later on. Thus, Uhde Hagen was able to gain valuable experience in the operation of LDPE plants.

Today, Uhde High Pressure Technologies covers a wide range of industrial high-pressure technologies – ranging from waterjet cutting, urea and LDPE equipment to turnkey high-pressure plants for the food industry and the pharmaceutical industry. Such a wide range of products would not be possible without the historical development and the confidence shown by our customers.

We thank all our customers, suppliers and fabrication partners for the confidence shown to us for many years and for the good cooperation.

For over 80 years - high pressure technology from Hagen for the world

We thank all our customers, suppliers and manufacturing partners for the long-term trust and good cooperation.

5th Global LDPE Maintenance Workshop

More than 90 participants from over 20 countries attended Uhde’s 5th Global LDPE Maintenance Workshop from June 7th to 9th, 2010. This year the workshop could be conveniently combined with the LDPE safety conference in Cologne and the Burckhardt compressor symposium in Winterthur, Switzerland.

In the morning sessions presentations were held on a great variety of important plant issues, from high level process aspects presented by the Technical University of Darmstadt to very practical maintenance issues like the cleaning of high pressure tubes from polymer residuals. To balance Uhde’s and other key industry supplier’s presentations also the User’s presented their point of view when it comes to operational and maintenance issues of equipment in their plants. For some older plants the original equipment manufacturers do not exist any more so that these User’s are especially keen for support and hints on how to improve their safe and efficient operations. The best User’s paper was elected by the participants to be Ahmed Al-Khaldi’s (Kemya) “MP Steam Waste Heat Boiler Head Flange Welds Defect & HP Tubes Bundle Heavy Scaling”. As a gesture of recognition of their contributions presenting Users received the legendary “Uhde High Pressure Salt & Pepper Shakers” duly marked with their serial numbers.

On Monday evening the customary sports event took place with football, beach volleyball and badminton. As usually, it was great fun to move the body after many hours of sitting or standing. The team sports were organised in multi-national teams – we felt like the United Nations at sports. A special treat for the tastes of so many different cultures from Brazil to Japan and South Africa to Norway, was the fresh wok at the spot according to the individual “specifications”.

On Tuesday evening the conference dinner was held in the traditional German steel works of Henrichshuette, which now is a steel and iron museum. Since many of us are at least “hobby metallurgists” we greatly enjoyed climbing up the old blast furnace and enjoying the view from the top. A cartoonist offered drawings for anyone interested, which caused many tears and laughers for the bystanders for his funny interpretations.

The Wednesday sessions were co-organised by Berstorff Extruders who did a wonderful job with a very high level presentation and an exhibition of some of their masterpieces: extruder shafts with their different functional designs. Mr. Pfeiffer from Berstorff received a very positive feed-back for his organisation with many thanks also from Uhde. On the way back from Berstorff we passed the lovely small town of Minden with opportunities for sight seeing, shopping or relaxing in the café at the market square in the city centre.

Complete paper as pdf (with pictures)

Uhde HPT joins in the 4th Uhde Fertiliser Symposium

On May 19-21, Uhde in Dortmund opened its doors for the 4th Uhde Fertiliser Symposium. About 200 experts exchanged information and trends concerning the complete Uhde Fertiliser Portfolio. During the three-day event, the participants gained insight into the latest developments at Uhde, Uhde’s commissioning experience, experience in plant operation, plant safety and revamping.

The workshop tour at Uhde High Pressure Technologies (Uhde HPT) in Hagen was a special highlight for the participants. For the past 80 years Uhde HPT has been designing and manufacturing high-pressure equipment for the fertiliser industry true to its slogan “Engineered Solutions in High Pressure“. The customers, licensers and suppliers of Uhde could assure themselves of the manufacturing expertise of Uhde’s subsidiary in Hagen and get acquainted with the complete manufacturing program. During the workshop tour the visitors were particularly interested in valve technology and in the pre-fabrication of complete isometrics with subsequent laser measuring to guarantee fast and easy integration into the plant.

At the end of the workshop tour which was organised in 4 groups, the visitors were given the chance to enjoy a refreshment and to discuss their impressions in detail. After a photo had been taken in front of the Uhde HPT building, the participants visited the “Derby of Nitrogen Pioneers“ on the Dortmund racecourse.

Download Pics.