Question: Heating and cooling design issues for the wax liquid tank
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Today I saw a wax liquid storage tank that had both a hot oil jacket and cooling water coils; I can’t figure out what the purpose of such a design is How to operate it in actual use? Should hot oil and cooling water be used simultaneously, or should only one of them be used as needed?
I asked an experienced designer, and hot oil and cooling water are not turned on at the same time. When heating is required, the cooling water is stopped and hot oil is used for heating ； When discharge from the bottom is required, stop the hot oil and use cooling water to cool down before discharging. Thank you to all marine friends for your attention and support.
Based on the equipment tag number R-1201D (tempering tank), this device is not merely an intermediate tank; it is a tempering tank used for carrying out tempering reactions, functioning simultaneously as a reactor. It is common to require heat transfer during the tempering reaction process. Thus, it is understandable why two sets of measures have been implemented: a heat transfer oil heating/insulation jacket and circulating water cooling for heat removal.
Thank you for your reply. This device is called tempering; in reality, it involves mixing and dispersing wax with additives, with no chemical reactions taking place. It is simply because of the high viscosity of the wax that, under normal circumstances, hot oil is needed to lower its viscosity and improve its fluidity. At first, I couldn’t understand the purpose of the cooling water coil; it seems that it is used to cool the contents in the tank before discharging them from the bottom.