Why Are Shell And Tube Heat Exchangers Preferred?

By Author: NICHEFPP
Total Articles: 7
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Operating plants that need to heat and cool various chemicals in their process operations have many types of heat exchangers from which to choose. Knowledgeable operating plants rely on their past experiences with various types of heat exchangers to determine which of those best fits their processing needs and gives them the performance to meet their objectives while offering the best maintenance alternatives.

Many of the advantages of one type of heat exchanger over another type are obvious to a knowledgeable operating plant while many other advantages are much more subtle.

The obvious advantages of shell and tube heat exchangers over other types such as plate and frame heat exchangers whether gasketed or all welded, hairpin, spiral, or block heat exchangers are as follows:

Many more shell and tube heat exchangers exist which allow for the ease of securing competitive bids. The number of so-called specialty heat exchangers Is relatively small making competitive bidding more difficult
The ease of performing maintenance at the plant on the shell and tube heat exchanger. Specialty heat exchangers ...
... quite often require sending them back to the factory for repair and many are located overseas.
The local shops in many areas specialize in the repair of shell and tube heat exchangers, only repairs and are numerous.