Our gaskets for plates heat exchangers
World leader in the aftermarket of manufacture and supply of gaskets and plates for plates heat exchangers, we manufacture and supply the widest range of gaskets and plates on the market for almost every brand of plate heat exchanger and offer a high-quality range of products meeting your highest requirements.
MANUFACTURING AND PROCESS OF MCD® PHE GASKETS
Production unit
MCD has its own production facility in Wuxi, China. With a production capacity of two million gaskets per year, we manufacture every type of gasket, whatever the size, for all makes and models of plate heat exchangers.
years' expertise
customers in 90 countries
gaskets manufactured each year
committed employees
Production process of PHE GASKETS
MCD manufactures plates heat exchanger gaskets according to a strict high-precision process throughout the different steps:
1 SUPPLY OF COMPOUNDS
All our compounds and elastomers come from Europe to guarantee high-quality products
2 TOOL MANUFACTURING
MCD manufactures its own molds, on its site in Wuxi, which allows to be flexible and reactive.
3 GASKETS MANUFACTURING
After a first step of extrusion, MCD vulcanizes the rubber in presses (17 in total, from the smallest to the largest models).
4 QUALITY CONTROL
All gaskets are manually and individually controlled before being analysed in our lab in order to check their conformity to MCD quality standards.
A plate heat exchanger is designed to transfer the heat energy from one fluid to another that have originally different temperatures.
For example, a hot flow will get cooler while the cold flow will get hotter thanks to the paralleled traffic of both ones. The plates heat exchanger is composed by several chevronned plates (usually aluminum, stainless steel or hastelloy) to fit together. The thickness of the plates is generally between 0.1 and 0.8 mm. They are stuck together either by welding or using gaskets to permit to have not much space between them and seal them.
In many heat exchangers the flows usually follow the same process. The different ways of circulation have an impact on the efficiency and the quality of the transfer. A heat exchanger which makes two flows entering on the same side is named one way running. A heat exchanger which makes two flows circulate countercurrent is named methodic. Usually, the methodic type is considered as more efficient.
Drawing of alternating flow heat transfer:
There are two kinds of heat movement: the monophasic one and the dysphasic one
The monophasic movement consists in mixing two flows (gas or liquid) without any change of state (liquid at the beginning of the process and liquid at the end). This exchange works thanks to the decrease or the rise of temperature.
The dysphasic movement consists in mixing two flows too but with a change of state. For example, in a plate evaporator, both flows are in a liquid state at the beginning and become a gas at the end of the process.
The plate heat exchangers can have either a monophasic movement (as sterilizer, pasteurizer…) or a dysphasic one (as evaporator, condenser, air-conditioner…).
In the family of plate heat exchangers, we are going to talk about two types of plate heat exchangers: the welded plates and the gasketed ones.
The welded plate heat exchangers are compacts and resisting to the high pressure. Generally, they are made with stainless steel plates. The welded plate heat exchangers can resist about thirty bars.
The plate 0076 heat exchangers are known for their easiness of maintenance. This type of heat exchanger is designed to be easily disassembled and reassembled it is thinking for the disassembly and the assembly of them. Thanks to the configuration, it is possible to add some plates in order to increase its heating transfer surface.
The gasketed plate heat exchangers present several advantages like the evolution of itself along the time, the easy opening, the circuit cleaning, the efficiency of the flow exchange, the easy way to install and the gasket choice.
On the market, there are two kinds of gaskets: the glued gaskets and the free-glued (clipped) gaskets. These gaskets are made from an elastomer composition (which is one of the polymers).
The glued gaskets are stuck to the plates thanks to an epoxy glue which is composed of resin and curing agent. This glued solution is an alternative to the welding and is known for its lifetime and for its resistance to the water. The glued gaskets are also known for their capacity to remain in place when you must open a plate heat exchanger.
The free-glued (clipped) gaskets are installed thanks to a special fixing system (that depends on the plate heat exchanger brand) which is perfectly fitting the dedicated grooved spaces on the plate. These gaskets are known to be often changed in some applications (Industries that use aggressive products notably)
