Spiral Wound Gasket Manufacturers and Suppliers are your best resource for understanding the selection process. When choosing a gasket material recovery and compression set should be important considerations. That’s because joints flex and move under changing temperature and pressure. If the gasket material can’t adapt to a varying distance between flanges the joint is certain to leak.
Rather than rely on the inherent material properties, spiral-wound gaskets seal by acting like a spring, expanding and contracting to fill the space available. Spiral-wound gaskets aren’t the solution to every gasketing problem, but for flanged joints, and especially those in petrochemical industries, they can be an excellent solution.
Spiral-wound gasket construction
Spiral-wound gaskets are made from a flat metal strip coiled into a shape rather like a clock spring. Interleaved with the steel is a good sealing material like PTFE or graphite. The metal is given a bend as these are coiled so that in profile it has a ‘U’ or ‘V’ form.
This profile gives the gasket its excellent recovery. Imagine the flange faces pressing against the legs of the ‘V’: closing the gap compresses this shape while opening it lets the ‘V’ spread further apart. In this way, the gasket stays in contact with each flange and maintains a good seal.
Most spiral-wound gaskets have a solid metal outer ring. This prevents over-tightening which would damage the gasket. Some also have an inner ring to protect against chemical attack or high pressure.
When to use a spiral-wound gasket
Spiral-wound gaskets excel in flange applications that see big swings in temperature and pressure. (The kind of environment that makes bolts lengthen and clamping pressure drop.) In addition, when the non-metallic element is PTFE or graphite these gaskets provide excellent resistance to chemical attack. This is why spiral-wound gaskets are the gasket of choice in refinery and related petrochemical applications.
Spiral Wound Gasket Manufacturers and Suppliers
It takes specialized equipment to manufacture spiral-wound gaskets. The leading producers are Flexitallic and Garlock. At Hennig we stock gaskets from both, and if you need something non-standard we can get that for you too. If you have an application you think needs a spiral-wound gasket, call or email and we’ll be happy to help.
