Ball valves and plug valves are two commonly used valves. In fact, the ball valve evolved from the plug valve. In principle, the ball valve can also be regarded as a special plug valve. The plug valve core is cylindrical or cone-shaped, while the ball valve core is spherical.
In this article, we will briefly introduce the difference between the two to help you better choose the right valve for your project.
Application Of Ball Valve:
Source: saVRee
Ball valves are widely used in petroleum refining, long-distance pipelines, chemical industry, paper making, pharmaceuticals, water conservancy, electric power, municipal administration, steel and other industries.
The Characteristics Of The Ball Valve:
1. Compact structure, reliable sealing, simple structure
2. Convenient maintenance
3. The sealing surface and the spherical surface are often in a closed state, which is not easy to be eroded by the medium
4. Easy to operate and maintain
5. It is suitable for general working media such as water, solvents, acids and natural gas, and also suitable for media with harsh working conditions, such as oxygen, hydrogen peroxide, methane and ethylene, etc. It is widely used in various industries
6. Available in manual type, electrically type and pneumatically type.
The ball valve body can be integral or combined.
Advantages Of Ball Valve:
1. The ball valve has low fluid resistance, and the full-bore ball valve basically has no flow resistance.
2. Simple structure, small size and lightweight.
3. Close and reliable. It has two sealing surfaces, and the current sealing surface materials of ball valves are widely used in various plastics, which have good sealing performance and can achieve complete sealing. It has also been widely used in vacuum systems.
4. It is easy to operate and open and close quickly. It only needs to rotate 90° from fully open to fully closed, which is convenient for remote control.
5. The maintenance is convenient, the structure of the ball valve is simple, the sealing ring is generally movable, and it is convenient to disassemble and replace.
6. When fully open or fully closed, the sealing surface of the ball and the valve seat is isolated from the medium, and the medium will not cause erosion of the valve sealing surface when the medium passes.
7. The ball valve has a wide range of applications, with a diameter ranging from a few millimeters to a few meters, and can be applied from high vacuum to high pressure.
8. Since the ball valve has wiping properties during opening and closing, it can be used in media with suspended solid particles.
Application Of Plug Valve:
Source: saVRee
Stopcock valves are widely used in oilfield mining, transportation and refining equipment, and are also widely used in petrochemical, chemical, gas, natural gas, liquefied petroleum gas, HVAC and general industries.
Advantages Of Plug Valves:
1. Suitable for frequent operation, quick and light opening and closing.
2. The fluid resistance is small.
3. Simple structure, relatively small size, light weight and easy maintenance.
4. Good sealing performance
5. It is not restricted by the installation direction, and the flow direction of the medium can be arbitrary.
6. No vibration and low noise.
Disadvantages Of The Plug Valve:
1. Cannot be used for throttling
Post time: Dec-15-2021