It was a great live chat yesterday evening with forum members and the technical director at Kane International. I thought you may want to see some informative comments that was made regards the technology used in portable Gas Flue analysers.
Hi Derek with the Kane 455 we use Infra-red technology to measure the CO2 and our own Monox sensor to measure CO. the Infra-red sensor has an infinite life as there is no deterioration like an electro-chemical sensor, the Monox Co sensor is expected to last approximately 7 years.The 455 now comes with a 6 year warranty and cost just £84 per year for check-recal & certification. this will cover all internal parts.
There are two main benefits to using Infra-red sensors over electro-chemical. The first is the long life allows us to fix the cost of ownership so there are no nasty surprises in 18 months-2 years. The second is the greater accuracy you get when directly measuring CO2 as oppose to calculating CO2 like the Anton or Testo.
The Kane 455 works very well with the Worcester range as i say the accuracy of the CO2 measurement helps with 0.2% either side of the book target you you need to know the true reading. Also the 455 has an auxiliary screen that allows you to customise the readings so you can perform a negative pressure reading when required by certain models at the same time you are analysing the flue gases, this will provide with a report with both readings on.
The resolution for our CO2 sensor is 0.1% and the accuracy +/- 0.2% of reading.
There is an issue when using electro-chemical sensors when the CO2 content is high. As a manufacturer we made the decision 4 years ago to stop using this old technology and invest in developing our range of Infra-red sensors. As the CO2 gets higher in say high efficiency gas boiler or an Oil boiler a chemical 02 sensor gets less and less accurate. this could lead to an engineer making unnecessary adjustments to the boiler.
Most of the other models available to in this country apart from Kane use chemical sensors usually supplied by City Technology. This company acknowledges there is an issue and on there own website they have made a statement to this affect.
Another issue I have with the Anton/Worcester combination, some older boilers were fitted with a Prettl valve which when it breaks send the gas/air ratio out to thousands ppm, this quickly destroys the sensors, how would Kane cope with say 2000ppm?
The 455 will measure up to 4000ppm for 15 minutes and then purge the sensor. it will not saturate the sensor as it will clear in approximate 5 minutes. If you saturate an chemical sensor with high CO in can take a very long time to clear if you are lucky, if your not lucky it may need replacing. At Kane's we had all of these issues back in 2008 i am glad the dark days are over for us.
The new Kane 457 is designed to EN50379, BS7967 and BS8494 this is the only analyser currently available to all three standards. the Kane 455 is designed to EN50379 & BS7967 and is the only analyser to have been independently approved to these standards.
Room CO testing or fumes investigation is now a more commonly used function on a flue gas analyser as more customers are using CO alarms. the 455 will perform a 15 or 30 minute room test to check the levels of carbon monoxide. As all you guys are now CPA1 qualified this is something that would have been shown and discussed when taking that assessment. The 457 will perform again a 15 or 30 minute room air test the difference being its monitoring CO levels and CO2 levels this is required when testing to CMDDA1 level.
