Cable Joint Failures

Resin Cable Joints

Cable joints can fail prematurely whilst in service or during pressure - upon investigation the reasons for cable joint failures as usually determined as careless cable jointer workmanship in constructing the joint.

Some practises identified not only contributed to the failure of the cable joint but also placed jointers and public at risk from injury from flashover  or explosion.

Cable Jointer Errors & Reasons For Cable Joint Failures

• Non standard or poorly applied earthing arrangements
• Incorrect mixing of cable jointing resin
• Incorrect cable stripping dimensions being used
• Cable sheaths and insulation being scored or damaged
• Using incorrect cable jointing materials or lack of jointer tools
• Discarded waste materials such as shear off bolt heads left within the cable joint body or within shrink down insulation tubes.

All cable joint failures should be properly investigated - if the joint failure is as a result of incorrect cable jointing, the cable jointers authorisation can be revoked.

The authorisation is usually only returned after a period of cable jointer re-training and assessment. 

In the following Blog article we investigate 5 separate cases of cable joint failure. 

Pictured : Cable Failure Caused By Hydron Carbons In Oil & Gas Industry

Further reading : A Shutdown Postmortem - Reducing Cable Failures Caused By Sub-Standard Cable Jointing