Under ambient conditions oxygen is a colorless, odorless gas. It is not flammable, but promotes combustion. The air contains 21 vol% oxygen. Already small amounts of higher oxygen rates increase the burn rate significantly. This can lead to fire ignition of materials. With increased oxygen concentrations, there is an increased risk of fire and explosion!
Especially during opening and closing operations of valves high speeds can occur. At high oxygen concentrations, this can lead to the ignition of plant parts if impurities of any kind are present in the valve together with unsuitable materials or lubricants.
1. Selection of oxygen-suitable metallic materials
The media-contacted parts must be made of metallic materials suitable for oxygen. When selecting suitable materials, we follow the IGC oxygen standard of the European EIGA. This standard indicates, that carbon and stainless steels may no longer be used at higher pressures due to the risk of inflammation, but only special so-called “exempt materials”. Therefore, we produce these ball valves either completely or optionally only the wetted areas from materials such as brass or monel and Inconel. Depending on the area of application and requirements, innovative designs are used.
2. Selection of suitable sealing materials
The sealing materials must be carefully selected when manufacturing oxygen valves. The sealing materials used at Hartmann have all been approved by testing institutes such as the German Federal Institute for Materials Research (BAM) in regard to oxygen burn-out safety for the related pressure and temperature range.
3. Ensuring oil and grease free production
Already natural grease like from our hands may be sufficient to cause ignition of materials in oxygen environment. Therefore, we have strict rules for the production of the valves, which are fixed in our oxygen work instruction, such as ultrasonic cleaning and the assembly and testing of the fittings in a separate oxygen room. In addition, only special lubricants suitable for oxygen are used in very small amounts during assembly, and the leak test that follows is carried out exclusively with gas. After successful testing, the oxygen ball valves will be packed in welded foil and separately marked to indicate that they are free of oil and grease.
We develop and manufacture two-way and multi-way ball valves for oxygen applications. By choosing the right design and following important regulations when manufacturing our oxygen valves, we can contribute to safe operation when shutting off oxygen plants, even at high temperatures and pressures.
Our oxygen ball valves are used when standard valves reach their limits. Hartmann’s oxygen valves therefore fulfill the following criteria:
One reference for high temperature oxygen service is our delivery to our customer Yara in Germany, where our valves are working at +400°C gastight as shut-off valves.
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