NAFTAGAZEXPO 2025 Exhibition
Welding and Non-Destructive Testing in the Oil & Gas Industry Seminar

On 14 October 2025, OKO GROUP participated in the “Welding and Non-Destructive Testing in the Oil & Gas Industry” seminar, organised by the Paton Publishing House. The seminar formed part of the NAFTAGAZEXPO 2025 industry exhibition. At the event, OKO GROUP’s process engineer, Anastasiia Pareniuk, delivered a presentation titled: "The TOFD Method as a Technique for Enhancing the Quality and Efficiency of Ultrasonic Testing of Welded Joints".

Ms Pareniuk informed the seminar participants about the detection of various types of defects using traditional ultrasonic methods, such as the pulse-echo and echo-mirror techniques, as well as the more modern Time-of-Flight Diffraction (TOFD) method. The TOFD technique involves recording diffracted ultrasonic waves generated at defect tips. Its key advantages include:

• high inspection speed, as the entire weld cross-section is scanned in a single pass;
• ability to detect defects regardless of their orientation, including planar defects such as cracks and lack of fusion;
• high accuracy in determining the coordinates and dimensions of detected defects;
• suitability for a wide range of wall thicknesses (6–300 mm).

The speaker also noted that the TOFD method is regulated by several international and national standards, including EN ISO 15626:2019, EN ISO 10863:2022 and CEN/TS 14751:2008. This confirms its widespread acceptance within the industry.

TOFD 2.2 PRO and TOFD MAN Systems

A key theme of Anastasiia Pareniuk’s presentation was OKO GROUP’s own developments: the TOFD 2.2 PRO and TOFD MAN Systems. These are used to inspect welded joints in main oil and gas pipelines, storage tanks, vessels, rail tank cars, ship hulls, and bridge structures.

Both systems deliver accurate and repeatable results and are convenient to operate. The TOFD MAN System is also equipped with a wireless data transmission function. The audience was also shown a video presentation to demonstrate the capabilities of these Systems.

During the presentation, Ms Pareniuk introduced the TOFD software developed by OKO GROUP. This software enables step-by-step setup and data acquisition and analysis. It allows users to save and load preconfigured settings for typical inspection tasks and is compatible with various devices, ranging from tablets to desktop PCs.

The presentation sparked numerous questions and a lively discussion.

Yurii Posypaiko, a senior welding engineer at the E.O. Paton Electric Welding Institute, emphasised that effective ultrasonic testing, including TOFD, requires high-quality acoustic coupling between the transducer and the surface of the object being inspected. He added that corrosion and heavy contamination can degrade coupling, leading to local loss of acoustic contact and/or signal distortion.

А.Parenyuk at a seminar on welding and non-destructive testing

From Development to Implementation: OKO GROUP’s Path in NDT

The seminar also covered the company's wider activities.

Today, the company designs and manufactures over 50 types of NDT instruments, ranging from portable flaw detectors and thickness gauges to automated inspection systems.

OKO GROUP produces more than 4,000 types of transducer, both as standard items and as customised solutions.

OKO GROUP’s equipment is currently in use in 78 countries worldwide and is successfully employed in the aerospace, railway, oil and gas, metallurgy, engineering and power generation industries, among others.

Despite wartime challenges, OKO GROUP continues to evolve, improving its technologies, instruments and solutions in line with international standards and customer requirements.

In the nearly four years since the start of the full-scale war, the company has maintained business stability and expanded its global reach by establishing new partnerships across Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

'We are always open to cooperation and strive to work with our partners to create effective solutions that contribute to industry development, improving product quality and enhancing operational safety across various sectors,' summarised Anastasiia Pareniuk, Process Engineer at OKO GROUP.