APPLICATION
We were asked by one of our customers, a major food manufacturer, to look at an issue they were having with seals on a rotary valve.
THE PROBLEM
The existing seals on the rotary valve were plain, food grade O Rings. However, they were standard sizes that were not offering sufficient interference, making sealing ineffective and leakage occurring in operation.
The customer also requested a detectable solution as a preference.
THE SOLUTION
The solution proposed by Evolution Seals was to replace the O Ring seal with a bespoke, custom designed machined seal, which would have a profile which would provide more stability in the housing, and being a custom machined seal, would allow tight control over the tolerances and allow the flexibility to be able to to modify the sealing interference if required.
Sealing material used was blue metal detectable EPDM providing the requested visibility and detectability
OUTCOME
A sample batch was manufactured and provided to the customer for testing and evaluation purposes. Following thorough testing and trials, it was found that the new replacement seal was 100% effective in it’s sealing efficiency without further modification.
Happy that the leakage problem had been resolved, and they now had the benefit of a detectable seal, the customer subsequently ordered full requirement batches for production.
