OREANDA-NEWS. September 18, 2012. Power Machines OJSC has completed the hydroturbine impeller reconstruction for plant's unit No. 4 of Cheboksarskaya HPP. Functional tests have been successfully performed in the Customer's presence according to the quality control plan. At present the company is carrying out the delivery of the hydro turbine subassemblies to the plant. The runner hub  has already arrived to the HPP in a special purpose vehicle.

The reconstruction is aimed at transferring the runner blade operating mechanism from propeller induced mode to Kaplan mode. The new mode of operation allows the turbine blades to change their angle depending on the pressure head and thus to generate maximum electricity at minimum water consumption.

Power Machines started the reconstruction of Cheboksarskaya HPP in 2007 by modernizing the blade operating mechanism of the runner No. 7. In 2011-2012 the power engineering company reconstructed the runners of hydropower units No. 16 and No. 8. Having signed a contract for the reconstruction of seven more runners along with the production of new parts and assemblies in 2011, Power Machines and RusHydro expanded the scope of their cooperation aimed at renovating the hydropower units of Cheboksarskaya HPP. The first of them – the runner of hydropower unit No. 4 – is to be put into operation in Q4 2012. The delivery of the last of the seven reconstructed runners is scheduled for May 2016.

Cheboksarskaya HPP’s hydropower units have environmentally friendly design with an oil-free runner hub. This project was developed in the 1970s at Leningradsky Metallichesky Zavod which produced equipment for Cheboksarskaya HPP and Nizhnekamskaya HPP in the 1980s. In 2006 Power Machines completed the project of the existing runner reconstruction.

Vladimir Dorofeyev, Director of Cheboksarskaya HPP (RusHydro JSC affiliate), points out, “The turbines modernization is conducted with the possibility of raising the Cheboksary reservoir full supply level to an 68 m watermark, which both the plant and its hydropower units were designed for”.

The reconstruction of Cheboksarskaya HPP runners is carried out within the framework of the major program of comprehensive modernization of the plant, which is implemented by RusHydro and aimed at not only increasing the hydropower units’ output but at improving the reliability and operational safety of the entire HPP as well.
 This project continues successful cooperation between Power Machines and RusHydro. At present the companies are performing together the renovation of Sayano-Shushenskaya HPP and reconstruction of hydropower units for Volzhskaya, Rybinskaya and Zhigulyovskaya HPPs.