Heating issues in reaction vessels
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One of our reaction vessels requires heating, and steam is currently used for this purpose. Since the material being processed is heat-sensitive, the steam temperature can easily rise too high. Therefore, the steam pipes in use lead in from the bottom of the reaction vessel and out from the top; this allows some water to be present in the pipes, thereby helping to reduce the temperature. However, this approach presents another problem: it can cause water hammer effects, resulting in significant vibrations. If I use hot water, the heating process is too slow, which affects efficiency. My idea is to install a steam pressure relief valve; I’m not sure if that would work
A “temperature and pressure reducer” can be installed, along with transmitters for monitoring and parameter control: 1 temperature sensor, 2 pressure sensor, 3 flow sensor.
It should work; by reducing the pressure, the temperature will also drop. However, the water should be drained first before allowing air to enter; frequent water hammer can cause significant damage to pipeline equipment.
I just checked – to reduce the temperature, it’s necessary to add pipes, and one also has to take into account the precision of the equipment as well as maintenance issues; it’s relatively complicated. It’s better to consider using only pressure reduction
There are types of temperature and pressure reducing valves; you might want to take a look at those
Lowering the pressure naturally results in a lower temperature. By using a pressure reducing valve to lower the pressure, the temperature downstream of the valve also drops. Where does this loss of energy go? Is it used to overcome the resistance of the pressure reducing valve? If it is saturated steam, will the steam behind the valve become superheated steam?
This post was last edited by xqmy198 on 2015-9-24 at 10:09. It turns out that it’s saturated steam; it does not turn into superheated steam after pressure reduction! When the pressure is reduced, the steam expands, its flow rate increases, and its temperature drops, while condensate is also formed. In this case, there is actually no need for pressure reduction – the steam coming out of the boiler is already saturated steam. As long as it isn’t completely condensed into water from the inlet to the outlet, it simply changes from saturated steam to saturated water. The temperature remains constant (at the same pressure, the temperature of saturated water and saturated steam is exactly the same). What is absorbed is only the latent heat of vaporization. Therefore, the best approach is to have the steam enter at the top and exit at the bottom, while also installing a liquid collection container in the steam outlet pipeline along with steam trap circuits. (This is just my personal opinion; I’m not an expert in process engineering.)