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Budget Alert

The 2003 Budget expanded the range of equipment on which 100% First Year Allowances (Capital Allowances) can be claimed by all companies to include water monitoring equipment.  A new Web site has been set up specifically for the water industry - www.eca-water.gov.uk  

Sparrow has recently won a three-year contract to maintain the first WPL Purestream Sequential Batch Reactor (SBR) at the new M3 Winchester RoadChef Service Area. Originally chosen to accommodate diverse variations in flow and organic loading, the dual stream system will treat effluent from both north and southbound carriageways at the 24-hour facility.

The new RoadChef Service Area comprises 24-hour restaurant facilities, petrol forecourt, restrooms and a single travel inn unit on the southbound carriageway. The site equated a total design flow of 100m³/day, with the capacity to handle a 7 l/s surface water runoff from the areas below the canopies of the petrol filling forecourt during a 1-10 year storm. As a measure to accommodate this, an additional balancing capacity was adopted at the head of the works with a total holding capacity of approximately 16 hours at design flows. 

To accommodate fluctuating demand, the SBR works on approx. 8 cycles in every 24 hours, automatically switching from high to low flow, or idle mode. A discrete batch-type system allows for flow equalisation and upstream balancing, and Sparrow dial-up daily from their remote office to monitor flows.

Sparrow have continued to expand their engineering team to capitalise on this type of maintenance contract. Steve Hunt, General Manager commented; "We are delighted to have won this contract and are already discussing with two other clients how our specialist knowledge of pumps and pump maintenance can help meet their needs". Sparrow are also discussing the roll-out of this maintenance contract for other RoadChef sites across the UK.

The National Trust recently employed the services of Sparrow to upgrade a borehole pump together with associated water treatment equipment. Wellmaster hose was selected for the replacement of the steel rising main. It was recommended because of a number of key features which included: no corrosion, no flanges or joints, rapid installation, short turn-around on maintenance, improved hydraulics, power savings and no scaling or microbial attack. The system consists of a borehole pump, hydrovar controller and ultra violet unit.

The Hydrovar was specified by us as it does much more than just change motor speed. It truly manages your pump performance to match a wide range of system conditions, allowing energy savings of up to 70% in some applications. It also has space saving attributes from the elimination of sophisticated control cabinets and panel, together with reduced vessel size. It can be fitted to any standard IEC motor; high efficiency fitted if required. Hydrovars can be used on motors from 0.55kw to 45kw. On this basis the hydrovar controller was felt to be the natural choice for this type of application.

The ultra violet unit was installed to protect water supply by continually sterilising it. It also has the benefits of using no chemicals with consequently no alteration of taste to treated water which can be associated with some chemical treatments.

We have expanded our engineering team, and are building on our extensive coverage of the South West, developing across the South of England including London and the South East. We have reorganised our parts operation having experienced growing demand for specialist parts from across the world and now offer national and international rapid delivery.

We continue to offer a comprehensive 24 hour, 7 days a week service to our clients which recognises the need for a professional approach and quick response in the event of plant, pumps or equipment failure.

Our management team is headed up by Steve Hunt, General Manager. Steve has been involved with pump maintenance on both potable and dirty water networks and has considerable project management experience. Steve Kelly is our Field Operations Manager and Derek Holliday controls procurement and the warehouse operation.

As recognised Seepex service engineers, we have extensive experience in the application, installation and maintenance of the complete range of Seepex pumps and pumping equipment. We are currently involved in the planned maintenance of a Seepex Progressive Cavity Pump (PCP) installed at Ringwood Brewery in Dorset where they produce high quality, cask conditioned beer such as "Old Thumper" and "Boondoggle".

Here, as in many such plants, hot and cold liquor was originally fed down by gravity from a tall tower to a grist case and then into the mash tun. Very often due to the position of the grist case, conveyors had to be set up to move the grist to the steels masher resulting in higher incremental costs and mixing problems. Ringwood Brewery increasingly became aware that a PCP was by far the most effective option for moving process waste away from the production environment and for the safe movement of grists within the production area.

For any brewery or distillery wanting to upgrade its production or waste disposal operations we can provide impartial advice on the best means to achieve this in a cost efficient manner. In the majority of applications, in addition to contributing to processing cost reductions, PCPs can minimise noise pollution and improve cleanliness and energy consumption.

We’ve continued to see a steady growth in demand for maintenance contracts across a wide range of clients from food production to sewage plants. There has been significant growth as production and plant engineers look to reduce downtime without having the excessive labour costs often associated with emergency repairs.

Sparrow’s approach is to provide regular, planned maintenance over the year with arrangements for holding in stock customers’ specialist parts if required, which enables even quicker servicing and repair times.

Our maintenance contracts will cover pumps servicing water treatment equipment and sewage plants. Some of our recent clients include:

FPD Savills Longleat Estate Millfield School Parkdean Leisure

Stover School Westlands Woodbury Park Golf Club Wyke Farms

If you’d like further information on Sparrow’s maintenance services, please e-mail Steve Hunt at steve.hunt@absgroup.com

We’ve been involved with water companies for over 50 years and currently undertake work for Bristol Water, Wessex Water, South West Water, Bournemouth Water and Thames Water. Works typically include upgrading of pumps and plant and the introduction of planned maintenance programmes.

In a recent independent customer survey we received consistently good reports regarding:

Quick response Quality equipment

Quality workmanship 24 hour backup.

For information on any of the above, please contact Steve Hunt (details on the Contact Us page).

Sparrow Water, suppliers of: water pumps, pump spares, sewerage treatment,
boreholes, UV filters, water pipe fittings, submersible pumps, iron removal, pH correction,
and many other water related products and services.
Tel: +44 (0)1935 415 940
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