Knowing your valve function, the materials that are processed, operating pressure, temperature, specific requirements, size and flow will help insure you are able to specify the correct valve for your application.
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Determine the answers to the following questions:
What industry will this valve be used in? Agricultural & Farming, Energy, Food & Beverage, General Chemical, Manufacturing, Pharmaceutical, or Plastics.
What typical materials (media) are being processed? Is the material abrasive, corrosive, light, or heavy? Are there sanitary requirements?
What are the weight considerations? The weight of a valve is especially important for mobile or rotating equipment. High performance and heavy-duty models can weigh four times as much as its regular-duty counterpart. Dust tight, full vacuum, and 1 bar service, is considered to be regular duty service. 90 PSI (6bar) to 150 PSI (10bar) is high performance. An 8-inch manually operated regular duty valve can weigh 55 lbs. (25Kg), versus nearly 200 lbs. (90Kg) for an 8″ high performance model.
What is the valve function? Inlet valve, outlet valve, or pipe inline valve?
What is the operating pressure range?
What is the operating temperature range? High temperature requirement?
What are the port inlet and outlet sizes?
Mounting: The typical ANSI 150 # and DIN drilling is used as an industry standard for heavy duty and high-performance models. Quick clamps can also be used for applications up to 30PSI (2bar) and port sizes up to 10″. For 1″ to 3″ VB ball valves NPT, Socket weld and Tri-Clamps connections are options.
Some valves will include blind tapped holes, which may be a problem if the valve is mating with existing blind tapped holes. Another option is to choose over-sized flanges, which allows for through holes. For regular duty service valves, ANSI and DIN bolting can be overkill and alternative bolting patterns are available.
Seats: Very abrasive material will tend to dictate using metal seats versus the more commonly used reinforced Teflon seats.
The metal seal will give longer life and can be used at higher temperatures than Teflon but the shut-off sealing is limited to dust tight, ANSI class IV or ANSI class V. Reinforced Teflon can be used up to 450 degrees F (230 C), and provide Class VI shut-off.
Service: Dust tight are used for most gravity feed powder applications where the process is not under vacuum or pressure.
O-Ring Material: Silicone O-rings are typical. Viton and Teflon Encapsulated Silicone are used for specific chemical resistance. Most other materials are available on request.
Operators (Actuators): Double acting pneumatic operation is the first choice for reliability, speed, weight, and value. Levers and gear drives are also available. Pneumatic operators are available in double acting or single acting (spring return) fail-safe modes. Spring return actuator are slower, bigger, and heavier.
As with other quarter turn valves; levers, gear drives or chain operators are available. Pneumatic and hydraulic, operators are available in double acting or fail-safe modes. Pneumatic operation should be the first choice for price, reliability, and speed. When handling solids a higher factor of safety is used to calculate seat torque requirements. The factor is typically 1.5 instead of the 1.25 used for liquid and gas valve calculations.
For solids that “set-up” or harden over-sized actuator and specially designed discs that can break through the hardened cake are used. Actuators are typically sized for 80-PSI (5.3 bar) pressure. If the available supply air pressure is dependably higher (100 to 120PSI) or lower (40 to 60 PSI), this will factor in the sizing of the actuator.
For fail-safe operation, spring return actuators are the norm. When a spring return type actuator is used, it is over-sized to compensate for the spring as well as the unseating, run, and seating torque required for valve operation. This can lead to weight and space problems as well as extra cost. An alternate fail-safe option is to use a double acting actuator with a pneumatic accumulator sufficiently sized to close the valve. If there is a loss of pneumatic pressure, a pressure switch activates the accumulator and operates the valve.
Control: Single solenoid (spring return) fail closed on loss of control signal is typical. Fast acting (1 to 5 seconds), quarter turn valves are ideal for flow control of solids. A pneumatic (3 to 15 PSI) or electro-pneumatic (4 to 20 milliampere) positioner can take a signal from a manual adjusted pressure regulator, or from a computer controller. The pneumatic positioner is often used in manually operated filling stations, while the electro-pneumatic positioner is typical for variable discharge which is often used for automatic loss-in-weight systems.
Feedback: Typical for automated valves is two mechanical limit switches indicating fully open and fully closed with a visual beacon indicator.
Electrical Classes: NEMA 4/IP64 wash down and Explosion proof NEMA 7 and 9 are standard. Other classification including IS Intrinsically Safe are offer as engineered options.
Voltage: The Voltage of an electrical appliance indicates the voltage at which the appliance is designed to work. Typical power of a single solenoid is 7.2 Watts. The current consumption at that voltage is displayed on a rating plate attached to the appliance.
Clean in Place (CIP): For automatic cleaning, spray balls or jets should be considered. Another option is the Sani K Valve that can be dismantled by hand for inspection and cleaning. For safety reasons the size of such valves are typically limited to an 8″ port diameter due to the weight of individual components.
CIP ports is a 1-1/2″ ferrule fitted with a Teflon plug, cap and quick clamp. Spray ball is supplied with cap and plug to be used if spray ball is removed between cleaning cycles.
In the simplest terms, a valve is a device used to control the flow of a medium — liquid, gas or solid — through a piping system. Most commonly, valves are used to stop and start the flow of media. Some valves are also able to control the rate of flow, these are commonly referred to as control valves.
Because there are so many different uses for valves, they are available in a wide range of mechanical variations. Using the appropriate valve in a given scenario means your application will run smoothly and safely, accomplishing the intended goal most efficiently.
Though there are many different valve classifications, most valves fall within three categories: rotary, linear and self-actuated.
Rotary valves utilize a rotating closure component to block flow within a piping system. Most often, this rotation is limited to 90 degrees, which is why rotary valves are also commonly referred to as quarter-turn valves. These types of valves are closed at 0 degrees and open at 90 degrees.
Some rotary valves can operate with a larger degree of rotation and include more than two positions. Common examples of rotary valve types are butterfly, plug and ball valves.
Linear valves use a flow obstructer — such as a disc, slat or diaphragm — that moves in a straight line to start, stop or adjust flow through a piping system. These valves can be separated into two distinct types: rising stem (multi-turn) and axial.
Multi-turn linear valves work particularly well in control applications and include globe valves, gate valves and needle valves. Axial valves, such as coaxial and angle seat valves, are fast-acting and used primarily in on/off process applications.
Compared to other categories of valves, linear motion valves tend to have longer cycle times than rotary valves.
Unlike linear and rotary valves, self-actuated valves do not require direct input from the operator. Instead, they use the pressure within the process line to open or close a pressure control valve. This valve type is commonly used as a pressure relief valve and only opens once maximum allowable pressure is reached within the system. As a result of this mechanism, self-actuated valves are common safety requirements in certain applications.
Common self-actuated valves include relief valves, safety valves, check valves and steam traps.
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Since quarter-turn valves allow for a wide range of motion with the turn of a handle, these valve types are commonly used in applications that prioritize quick and easy opening/closing over precision.
Ball valves can be used in most applications where a fluid flow needs to be shut off. In fact, they are the most widely used process control valve. These rotary valves use ported spheres that swivel in the pipe stream, working to start or stop flow.
Since the valve’s port can be fitted precisely to match the pipe’s diameter, ball valves offer low head loss. Ball valves may be more expensive than other rotary valve options, but they offer better sealing than types such as butterfly valves.
Butterfly valves work using a center-mounted, disc-shaped obstructer that sways in and out of the piping system’s flow. These quarter-turn valves are frequently used with larger pipe sizes and in wastewater plants, power plants and other process plants where shut-off, regulation, and isolation are called for.
Advantages of using butterfly valves include lower cost and smaller size. However, these common valve types are more vulnerable to leaks and head losses than ball valves and may not work as well against high-pressure flows.
Plug valves are very similar to ball valves in their construction and function. However, instead of using a ball-shaped obstructer, plug valves obstruct or allow flow via a tapered cylinder that swings into or out of the flow stream. There are two main types of plug valves: lubricated and unlubricated.
This type of rotary valve is frequently used for shut-off and as a control valve for chemical processing industries, processing plants and wastewater treatment facilities. Plug valves may be favored for their lack of voids and cavities, and their ability to be adjusted for leaks that develop over the long term. As a result, these valves are often used in extreme service scenarios — think corrosive environments like oil refineries and chemical plants.
Commonly used in flow control applications, multi-turn valves work by cranking a handle to move an obstructer element into the flow path. This restricts flow within the piping system. Some types of multi-turn valves enable the flow to be released or blocked at variable speeds. These types of valves are commonly referred to as control valves.
Globe valves work by using a globe-shaped disc to block flow when closed against a restriction orifice. These multi-turn valves are commonly used in on/off and throttling applications. Globe valves can seal both against or with fluid flow.
Two-way globe valves are recommended for precision, while 3-way globe valves are suitable for combining media from two inlet ports and sending the resulting mixture through an outlet port. Globe valves are frequently used in wastewater plants and food processing services. Although this valve type is available in many variations, the most prevalent is the Z-style valve.
Gate valves are multi-turn valves commonly used to block flow streams and occasionally (and sometimes ineffectively) for throttling. This multi-turn valve type utilizes a plate-like barrier to block a flow stream.
Gate valves offer lower head losses when open compared to other valve types. Although their operation is comparable to globe valves, gate valves offer less flow restriction and regulation capabilities.
Needle valves closely resemble globe valves aside from several key factors. First, they are smaller than globe valves and allow for more precise flow control within smaller systems. Additionally, they consist of a cone-shaped needle — as opposed to a disc-shaped plug — that moves into and out of an orifice to start and stop flow.
Needle valves offer a precise way of modifying fluid flow through a system. They can be used for on/on applications but may not be the best option in such instances, as they require many turns in order to close.
Much as the name suggests, on/off valves are fast-acting devices that either enable unrestricted flow or block flow entirely. Though these types of valves do not allow for precise flow adjustment, they are useful in various applications where speed is essential, for example when used for situations that require emergency shut-off.
Solenoid valves use a linear sliding obstructer to open or shut the valve or redirect the flow from one outlet to another. These valve types are available in many different sizes, from as small as one millimeter to as large as 100 millimeters. Furthermore, they can be composed of various materials such as cast iron, stainless steel, aluminum, plastic and brass.
Solenoid valves are commonly used in emergency shut-off service applications and high-pressure systems. They can also handle a wide range of temperatures, with some models able to handle temperatures as extreme as -418° F to ° F, making solenoid valves a popular choice for cryogenic processes.
A coaxial valve is a 2-position valve that can be either pneumatically or electrically actuated. Electric coaxial valves use an electromagnetic coil vs. a spring. Pneumatic coaxial valves use either air pressure vs. a spring or double acting air pressure (air pressure that comes from both directions). These valves use a shuttle obstructer to open or close and to divert flow to the correct outlet.
Coaxial valves are a good substitute for ball valves in many on/off applications. In fact, they are a more affordable, smaller, lighter, safer and faster alternative. Disadvantages of coaxial valves include lower flow capacity and limited fluid compatibility.
Closing out the list of different types of valves and their uses is the angle seat valve, another type of valve that can serve as a substitute for a ball valve in on/off applications. Seat angle valves use a built-in pneumatic actuator that can be double acting or spring return.
This 2-position valve includes an obstructer plug that goes into the valve at an angle in order to fit into the angled seat situated within the flow path. When the valve is open, the plug is retracted almost entirely out of the flow path, making this type of valve the highest flow fast-acting valve with the lowest pressure drop.
Compared to ball valves, angle seat valves are faster, less expensive and just as durable. The primary disadvantage an angle seat valve has when compared to a ball valve is that angle seat valves do not perform as well with media that carries particulates. Due to their linear nature, an angle seat valve is more prone to trapping objects against the seal when closing, which can lead to failure to create a tight seal and can damage soft seal components. Ball valves, on the other hand, will tend to wipe away any particulates as they close which keeps objects from getting caught between the ball and soft seals. Angle seat valves also tend to be better suited for applications with lower operating pressure.
Why is it important to choose a certain type of valve?
Different valve styles will perform differently in any given application. This may mean differences in both functionality (cycle speed, position control, etc.) and the lifespan of the valve. Some types of valves may be entirely inappropriate for certain applications.
What’s the difference between linear valves and rotary valves?
Rotary valves utilize a rotating closure component to block flow within a piping system, while linear valves function by raising or lowering a flow obstructor, such as a gate, globe or diaphragm. Rotary valves typically require only 90 degrees of rotation to cycle on or off, whereas linear valves require multiple rotations of the shaft to move the closure component.
Why should I consider an on/off valve?
On/off valves should be used in applications where the intended function of the valve is to stop or start the flow of media. On/off valves should not be used to modulate flow rate.
Why should I consider a control valve?
Control valves should be utilized in applications where more precise control of the media flow rate is required, though not all control valves are recommended for throttling.
Can all linear valves be used as control valves?
No; gate valves, for example, are not recommended for control applications and are intended to either be fully open or fully closed.
Why are some valves more expensive than others?
Cost is influenced by a wide variety of factors including materials of construction, manufacturing processes and the complexity of the design. There are many different features and options that may influence cost as well. For example, actuated valves will generally be much more expensive than manual valves.
Still not sure which valve type is best for your application? With decades of experience and expertise in the valve industry, Gemini Valve is here to provide the right solutions for your system. Contact our team today to get started.
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