Working Principle of Steam Compressor_Application of Steam Compressor

Working Principle of Steam Compressor

After the steam is filtered by the filter, the clean steam enters the main engine cavity through the air inlet valve, and the volume of the cavity changes from large to small to compress the steam. The volume change of the cavity is the volume of the closed cavity composed of the rotor, stator, large and small end covers, and vanes, which rotates under the drive of the motor. Because the inner circle of the stator is eccentric and the rotor keeps rotating at the center of the axis, the volume between the vanes changes according to their position. As the amount of the vanes slides out, it changes from small to large and from large to small. The steam is inhaled when the volume cavity becomes larger, and compressed when it becomes smaller. As the rotor continues to rotate, the process of steam continuous inhalation and compression is completed. The compressed steam passes through the oil-gas separator and is discharged from the main engine cavity through the pipe in the upper left corner of the figure. It is lubricated and cooled by the lubricating oil system. The thermostat controls the high-temperature lubricating oil to flow from the main engine cavity directly to the oil filter to the cooler. After being cooled by the fan, it passes through the oil filter and enters the main engine cavity. The cycle is repeated. The heat energy generated when the steam is compressed is continuously blown out by the fan through the exchange of the cooler. The hot air blown out by the cooler is generally 50°C higher than the room temperature.

Steam compressor type

Depending on the direction of flow through the steam compressor impeller, the equipment is called axial flow, mixed flow or centrifugal compressor. The most suitable type of compressor depends on the operating conditions of the application. The key parameters are the required pressure rise and the flow rate of the steam to be compressed.

In the evaporation industry, operations are often carried out in the vacuum range, the heating surface load is medium, and the temperature difference is small, so centrifugal and Roots recompressors are usually used.

Steam compressor applications

At present, domestic steam compressors are mainly used in chemical fields such as evaporation, crystallization, towers, and drying. The above industrial processes are also restricted by some factors. For example, in terms of drying, the low-temperature exhaust gas after drying contains a certain amount of non-condensable gases such as air and the compression ratio of the compression itself, which reduces its recovery value.

On the other hand, due to the common properties of condensable gases, steam compressors can also be used for solvent recovery, such as methanol, ethanol, etc.