Common Heat Exchanger Faults and Their Remedies
The common faults and treatment of heat exchangers are shown in Table 2-2.
 
No. Fault  Cause Solution
1 Two kinds of media mingling together (internal leakage)
  1. Corrosion perforation and cracking of heat exchange tubes
  2. Cracking of the expansion mouth (welding mouth) of the heat exchange tube and tube plate
  3. Sealing leakage of float head flange heat exchangers
  4. Sealing leakage of tight-ring type heat exchanger tube plates 
  1. Replace or block the leaky tube.
  2. Expand again (repair welding) or make blockage.
  3. Fasten bolts or replace sealing gaskets.
  4. Tighten inner ring compression bolts or replace packing  (gaskets).
2 Flange seal leakage
  1. Gaskets are under pressure, corrosion and deterioration.
  2. Bolts are weak, loose or corroded.
  3. Flanges lack of rigidity with sealing surface defects.
  4. Flanges are not parallel or misaligned.
  5. The gasket is of poor quality.
  1. Tighten the bolt and replace the gasket.
  2. Upgrade Bolts  material, fastening or replacing bolts.
  3. Replace flanges, or deal with their defects.
  4. Repair or replace the flange.
  5. Replace the gasket.
3 Poor heat transfer effect
  1. Heat exchange tube scaling
  2. Poor water quality, oil pollution and microorganisms
  3. Clapboard short circuit
  1. Remove scale by using chemical cleaning or jet cleaning method.
  2. Strengthen filtration and purification of media so as to strengthen water quality management.
  3. Replace the pipe box gasket or the partition.
4 Resistance exceeding allowable value
  1. Filter failure
  2. Scale formation inside and outside the casing and the pipe
  1. Clean or replace the filter.
  2. Clean the scale by jet or chemicals.
5 Severe vibration
  1. Resonance caused by medium frequency
  2. Resonance caused by external pipe vibration
  1. Change the flow rate or the natural frequency of the bundle.
  2. Reinforce the pipe to reduce vibration.
Table 2-2 Common failures and treatment of heat exchangers
 
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