PACKINGS

Other advantages include large effective interfacial area, high mechanical strength, and low cost. Its monolithic construction overcomes the problem of “opening out ” at the ends as can be experienced with ring-shaped packings. All packings is available in an array of sizes to provide multiple combinations of efficiency and pressure drop

Random Packings

Since rasching rings were first used in the early 1900’s, a number of different random packing type have been developed and used, Random packing is a type of randomly putting packing into the tower, and has various sizes ranging from 1/4 inch to 3 inch, in general, random
packing is comparably free from material selection limited by the features of the system.

In the case of the same kind of packing, if the size gets bigger, efficiency gets lower because pressure loss decreases, process capacity increases, but contact surface areas less.

The most common types are pall rings which are widely well-known, recently, NMTP is frequently used which has high void fraction and low aerodynamic drag of the saddle shape.

Structured Packings

Structured packing was developed in the early 1940’s, but failed to be popular because of liquid maldistribution and a lack of sufficient markets. Afterwards, corrugated sheet type structured packing was developed in the late 1970’s, and now it is widely used.

Structured packing cost high and makes maintenance difficult. Especially, the draw back is too vulnerable to fouling service. Despite this drawback, it is one of the most popular column internals today now that it has very low pressure loss and high performance.

Additionally, it is also frequently used for vacuum towers where pressure loss should be very low: especially, it is mostly used for the revamp of conventional internals.

 

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