Whilst working for Mapel Ghar in Iran I was asked to investigate a case of Groundbed malfunction on the pipeline which carries crude oil from the production facilities in the south to Rae Refinery, just south of Teheran.

There was a border conflict with Iraq at the time so there were occasional shells passing over, rockets and war planes etc.

The Cathodic Protection facility was at a pumping station and the design of the groundbed was totally wrong.

This had been realised and a French CP company had been asked to correct it.

They had installed a steel girder between the pipeline and the groundbed to reduce the peak in the 'attenuation curve' which was produced during the commisioning procedure.

This girder had been attached to the negative terminal of the Cathodic Protection Transformer Rectifier (T/R ) which had the effect of reducing the peak but also reduced the whole of the rest of the curve to zero.

The records show that they then changed their minds and connected the girder to the positive terminal of the T/R. This increased the peak so they engaged my services to correct the issue.

It was obvious that none of the parties understood cathodic protection in the field.

I re-designed the layout of the system and easily corrected the fault.

If you want to know how I did this you will have to take the Cathodic Protection Network Course. Accreditation requires that you could not possibly make the mistakes that I found at this location.