Marine structure surveys at Buckie are carried out by NDTScan, the Oxford based non-destructive testing company that works the UK coast with its own survey boat. Buckie harbour appears in the Department for Transport's freight statistics as a minor port, so commercial cargo still crosses its quays. Behind that traffic is a stock of steel piles, jetty steelwork, concrete quays and sea defences that lose section every year, and NDTScan's work is to measure how much and to say plainly what it means.
What NDTScan records at Buckie depends on the structure. On steel: wall thickness on a repeatable grid, corrosion maps of the thinned zones, pitting at the splash zone and grooving at the mud line. On concrete: reinforcement and cover by ground penetrating radar, carbonation and chloride depth, in-place strength, and every crack, spall and delaminated area located on a plan. On timber and cast iron: section loss, decay and fixings. All of it photographed and positioned so the next survey can be compared with this one.
The value of the work is in the interpretation. Ultrasonic readings on corroded steel need judgment: a probe on a pitted surface can read the pit or the plate, and NDTScan's reports say which. Concrete readings need the same care, and every Buckie report states what was found, what was not found and how confident each reading is, so the harbour engineer can design a repair, set a reinspection interval or defend a decision to an insurer.
NDTScan's advice to owners at Buckie is the same as on land: measure before you decide. A jetty with thickness data on a drawing can be managed, strengthened or replaced on evidence. One that has only been looked at from the deck will be closed or rebuilt on fear. The survey is the smallest cost in the chain, and the one that sets the size of every cost after it.
Scan before you repair. That is the standing advice for every Buckie client, and the reason NDTScan reports what the concrete contains before anyone specifies what to do about it.
Services at Buckie
- Ultrasonic Thickness Testing Remaining wall thickness and corrosion mapping on steel piles, sheet piles, jetty beams, dolphins, lock gates, pontoons and hulls at Buckie, measured on a repeatable grid from the boat, the deck or the foreshore.
- Concrete Condition Surveys Reinforcement and cover mapping by ground penetrating radar, carbonation, chloride and strength testing, and unit by unit condition recording on quay walls, sea walls, breakwaters, pier decks and slipways.
- Drone and ROV Inspection Drone survey of decks, fenders, ladders and superstructure above the waterline, and inspection-class ROV coverage of the piles and walls that stay submerged, all located on one plan of the Buckie structure.
Marine Work at Buckie
Around Buckie the work divides into baseline surveys that give an asset engineer numbers for a structure that has never been measured, targeted surveys where thinning or spalling has been seen and needs quantifying, pre-repair surveys that size a scheme correctly before it is priced, and reinspections that show the rate of change. Harbour authorities, marina operators, councils, the Environment Agency, engineers, contractors, insurers and private owners all instruct on the same basis.
NDTScan also surveys marine structures at The Forth, Glensanda, Sullom Voe, Aberdeen, Cairnryan and The Clyde and every other port and harbour in Scotland. The service is described in full on the marine surveys page.
About NDTScan
NDTScan is a specialist non-destructive testing company based in Oxford and led by Neil Smuts. Its marine work brings together ultrasonic thickness testing and corrosion mapping of steel, concrete scanning and condition surveys, drone inspection and ROV inspection, delivered from its own survey boat or from land. NDTScan is a Level 4 UKCSS Operator, the first in the UK to achieve that certification, and it attends Buckie and the whole of the UK coast from its Oxford base.