Learn More About Gas Cylinder Heaters

Why use Gas Cylinder Heaters?

Maintaining proper pressure in a gas cylinder is needed to keep operating properly.

There needs to gases in a vapor state near the top of the vessel so it can exit the valve. As the gases are dispensed a chilling effect is caused (called “the heat of expansion”, which are heat losses caused by vaporizing from liquid to gas) which can make the gas cylinder quote cold, even frosting over.

This causes the gases to remain in a liquid state which reduces the desired flow rate interrupting the process from working as intended. The trend in today’s marketplace is for higher and higher Flow Rates making heating gas cylinders more important than ever.

If the cylinder gets too cold due the ambient conditions or the chilling affect caused by the gases being dispensed condensation of the gas occurs. Due to this condensation, much gas is often unused in cylinders since at low temperature as it remains in liquid state. Cylinders are then not filled to a full level, wasting money on each fill-up. This can be alleviated by using our standard or custom-made Silicone Rubber or Fabric Heating Jackets/Blankets.

The maintaining the proper temperature (typically 70-120F) maintains the proper pressure inside, ensuring the desired Flow Rate is achieved and reducing wasted gas that has condensed at the bottom of the vessel.

What are Gas Cylinder Heaters?

Gas cylinder heaters are Heating Blankets, Heating Jackets or Silicone Rubber heaters which heat and insulate gas cylinders during discharging.  CHR Inc. keeps many standard sizes in stock, and others can be custom designed as the application requirement can be very different.

The size of the vessel, supply voltage, working environment and rate of flow need to be considered.

Integrating the proper watt density (watts sq/inch), thermal insulation and temperature sensors, CHR Inc.’s Gas Cylinder Heaters provide a system with performance and safety at economical prices.

Applications:

Many gases known to benefit from this process include SF6, NH3, CO2, propane, nitrogen, oxygen, BCl3, WF6, HF, etc.

For large facilities which will process many gas cylinders at one time, a central control panel can be supplied for maximum safety and easy operation. The temperature of all gas cylinders will be monitored and controlled from one single point.  Different levels of protection and alarming can be configured.

Utility Industry SF6 Gas Cylinders

Electric grid operators use SF6 switchgear to power up/off their high voltage transmission lines. The SF6 provides an inert blanketing media that prevents arcing when the circuit breakers open and close. SF6 is stored in cylinders in liquid form under pressure. Periodically, maintenance crew need to hook up the storage cylinders to the circuit breakers to replenish SF6 to the breaker and maintain the system’s operating pressure.

When the valve is opened and gas flow begins, the cylinder temperature drops rapidly (producing a chilling effect on the vessel) which slows down the flow of SF6 into the circuit breaker. Heat must be added to the cylinder to make up the heat losses caused by vaporizing from liquid to gas. Applying heat safely saves time and makes the process an efficient and convenient operation, and also ensures the maximum amount of SF6 is dispensed from the cylinder and best use of cylinder capacity.

CHR Inc.’s SF6 gas cylinder heaters provide a simple and quick method for supplying supplemental heat to SF6 containing cylinders. Thermal cut-offs are designed into all cylinder heaters to guard against overheat and decomposition of SF6.

ALD or Atomic Layering Deposition

Atomic layer deposition (ALD) is a vapor phase technique capable of producing thin films of a variety of materials. Based on sequential, self-limiting reactions, ALD offers exceptional conformality on high-aspect ratio structures, thickness control at the Angstrom level, and tunable film composition. With these advantages, ALD has emerged as a powerful tool for many industrial and research applications.

Vaporized these materials typically requires much higher temperatures, typically about 200 Celsius/392 Fahrenheit.

CHR Inc’s line of Silicone Rubber Heaters have successfully been used to heat and vaporize the ampules used for Atomic Layering Deposition.  Our solutions are custom designed to the application – sized to for the vessel/ampule being used, supply voltage and integrating any sort of temperature sensor desired.

What can CHR heat for you?