Every high-pressure cylinder carries a test date, and once the cylinder goes beyond said date, nobody will legally fill it. We recertify CO2 cylinders with ultrasonic testing, which resets that clock and keeps bottles in service. Cylinder testing is currently offered in Colorado only.
CO2 cylinder recertification inspects the bottle inside and out, uses ultrasonic testing to measure the cylinder wall and find flaws in the steel, and re-stamps it with a new test date if it passes. If it does not pass, it is condemned rather than returned to service.
That is the whole point of the exercise. A cylinder that has been dropped, corroded internally or heated can fail, and a failure at CO2 storage pressure is not a small event.
Because nobody is tracking it. Test dates are stamped on the neck of the bottle, in small characters, on equipment that lives in a back room. The first anyone notices is a driver refusing to fill it, which happens on the day you needed the gas.
On cylinders we supply, we track the dates and rotate bottles out before they expire. It stops being your admin entirely.
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Move onto managed cylinders and expiry becomes our problem instead of yours.
Ultrasonic cylinder testing is currently offered in Colorado only. In our other markets the test dates on the cylinders we supply are still tracked by us, so expiry never becomes your admin.
Ultrasonic CO2 cylinder testing either passes and re-stamps the bottle, or condemns it.
Where a bottle fails, CO2 cylinder replacement comes from our stock the same visit, so a condemned cylinder never becomes a supply gap.
A hydrostatic test fills the cylinder with water and pressurizes it. Ultrasonic testing measures the cylinder wall with sound waves instead, so the bottle is never filled with water.
That matters for CO2 in particular. Water left inside a CO2 cylinder can combine with the gas to form carbonic acid, which attacks the cylinder from the inside. Ultrasonic testing avoids that risk, and it is faster, so bottles get back into service sooner.
Corrosion, dents, gouges, fire damage and thread condition. Some cylinders fail here without ever being pressurized.
The valve comes out and the interior is checked for corrosion and contamination.
Sound waves measure wall thickness and pick up cracks and flaws in the steel. A wall below tolerance or a defect condemns the bottle.
A pass is stamped with a new test date and returns to service. A fail is taken out of circulation permanently and replaced from our stock.
It depends on cylinder type and jurisdiction, and the interval is stamped on the bottle. We track it for cylinders we supply so you do not have to.
It is condemned and taken out of service permanently. We replace it from our stock so your supply is not affected.
No. Bottles are rotated, so a full replacement arrives as the one due for test leaves.
No. We use ultrasonic testing, which is faster and does not put water inside the cylinder, where it can form carbonic acid with CO2.
Colorado only, for now.
Move onto managed cylinders and expiry becomes our problem instead of yours.
