Hospital Is Revived by New Water Heaters

What the Customer Needed

Naval Hospital in Beaufort, SC, was opened in 1949 and still today serves Active Duty Navy and Marine Corps personnel, retired military personnel and dependents living in or around the area. Thousands upon thousands of people depend on its services, so speed was of the essence when its water heater units went down one morning in June due to a cracked jacket and leak into the burner.

With no hot water in the barracks, the team knew the urgency with which they had to find the best solution. First option on the table was to replace the damaged parts, but the team quickly realized it was not an option due to a lead time on replacement parts of close to three weeks. Next option was to replace the entire unit, but the manufacturer had a lead time of 10-12 weeks. The team had to come up with another solution.

Solution

The team did a thorough review of the mechanical room at Naval Hospital Beaufort and took the necessary measurements. Armed with this information, they turned to the PVI OptiSize Tool, a tool from PVI that lets you easily and accurately right-size your water heater system. They were able to confirm that installing two PVI Conquest 130 units to replace the current units would work and meet the hot water demand of the barracks. On top of that, the proposed option added redundancy along with like-for-like units for ease of maintenance and parts replacement making it a more viable solution. Most importantly, though: Thermal Resource Sales and PVI were able to deliver the units in a matter of days.

Results / Return on Investment

The units arrived on the Friday of that same week, and the contractor worked through the weekend to get the units installed. The hospital barracks were back in operation Sunday afternoon, less than a week from the incident, and now boasting a redundant, reliable system that also delivers greater energy efficiencies than the replaced units.