THE COOLING TOWER COMPONENTS: HOW DO THEY WORK?

July 20, 2022
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Cooling tower is a common sight in many parts of the world. They are used for a variety of purposes. But what exactly is a cooling tower? What are its components, and how do they work together?

This article will discuss hybrid cooling towers and cooling tower components in detail and how they are used.

Cooling Tower Parts and their Functions:

A cooling tower is a type of tower that is used to cool water or other fluids. Cooling towers are often used in power plants, chemical plants, refineries and most industrial process plants and factories, where they are used to cool water heated by machinery. Cooling tower works by using the evaporation of water to remove heat from the water.

The main component of a cooling tower is the itself. The cooling tower is typically made of concrete, wood, or fibreglass. The cooling tower is also equipped with mechanical equipment consisting of fans, gears, driveshafts & motors, which help to circulate air throughout the cooling tower. The above mechanical draft and equipment help to evaporate the water, which in turn helps to cool the water.

Let’s take a closer look at all the important cooling tower parts.

Instrumentation and Electrical Systems:

A cooling tower’s instrumentation and electrical systems are responsible for monitoring and controlling the operation of the cooling tower’s water distribution system.

Cooling Tower Fan Motor:

When the cooling tower motor is in operation, the fan motor is responsible for the cooling flow and powering the fan and cooling tower part. The fan motor can be single speed, two-speed or inverter VFD driven motors.

Nozzles:

Cooling tower nozzles are used to spray water onto the fill media. The water sprayed from cooling tower nozzles onto the cooling tower fill media helps evaporate and cool the hot water.

Cooling Tower Float Valve:

As the name float distribution or float valves suggest, a cooling tower float valve distributes water evenly throughout the cooling tower.

Drive Shafts:

Drive shafts are used to connect the cooling tower motor to the fan.

Gear Box:

The gearboxes have many speed ratios and reduce the speed of the motor for optimal fan speed in each applicati

on. From time to time, part of the cooling tower gearboxes will need to be rebuilt or replaced.

Cooling Tower Louvers:

Cooling tower louvers help to eliminate the splashout of hot water from where the air enters the cooling tower.

Fan Deck:

The fan deck is the working surface of the cooling tower motor, which gives you access to the cooling tower mechanicals and entry to the fill pack.

Water Distribution Piping:

Water distribution piping is used to distribute water evenly throughout the cooling tower’s distribution system.

Cooling Tower Fans:

Cooling and cooling tower fans help to circulate air throughout the cooling tower.

Cooling Tower Structure:

This is the framework that supports the cooling tower structure & can be made of fire-retardant FRP, concrete, wood or steel. The lifecycle of the structure depends upon the materials of construction and the care and maintenance of the materials used.

Cold Water Basin:

The cold water basin is where the cooled water is collected and directed to the pump suction line.

Cooling Tower Drift Eliminators:

Cooling tower drift eliminator help to remove any droplets of water that are not evaporated.

Cooling Tower Fill Media:

The cooling tower fill media is the area where the water is mixed with the fan air flow and the main heat transfer takes place. It’s deeply important to have the right type of cooling tower fill media in order to maintain good thermal efficiency and maximize the efficiency of the cooling tower.

As you can see, there are many parts that make up a cooling tower. Each part has an important role to play in the operation of the cooling tower.

In order to keep your cooling tower in good working condition, it’s important to understand all the different part of the cooling tower parts diagram and how they work together.

How Does Cooling Tower Work?

Cooling tower uses the water droplets’ evaporation to remove heat from the water. As the water droplets evaporates, it takes heat away from the water. This process helps to cool the water.

The cooling process works like this:

Warm water is sprayed onto the fill media.
The evaporation process cools the warm water.
The cooled water is collected in the cold water basin.
The cooled water is circulated back to the machinery.

The cooling process is repeated over and over again to maintain the desired process temperature.

What is Cooling Tower Fill Material?

The fill material is one of the most important parts of a cooling tower. The fill material helps to increase the surface area of the cooling tower and maximizes the airflow to the water contact, which in turn helps to increase the evaporation rate.

Many types of fill material can be used in a cooling tower. The most common type of fill material is PVC. PVC is a durable material that is resistant to corrosion. Some other types of fill material that are used in cooling towers include:

PP – Polypropylene
Fiberglass
Stainless steel
Wood

The type of cooling tower packing amount of fill material that you use will depend on the specific needs of your cooling tower.

What are the fillings of cooling tower?

The fillings in cooling towers are essential for maximizing the contact area between the air and the water being cooled. They are designed to enhance heat transfer and increase the efficiency of the cooling process.

The fillings are typically made of plastic or other durable materials and are structured to create a large surface area.

Two main types of fillings commonly used in cooling towers are splash fill and film fill.

Splash Fill:

Splash fill consists of slats or bars arranged in a staggered pattern. When the water enters the cooling towers, it is distributed over the splash fill, which breaks the water into small droplets.

As these droplets fall through the open circuit wet cooling tower, they come into contact with the upward-flowing air, promoting efficient heat transfer. The splashing action also helps to increase the mixing of air and water.

Film Fill:

Film fill comprises thin, closely spaced sheets or channels that allow water to form a thin film as it flows over them. This type of filling creates a large surface area for heat exchange, maximizing the contact between the water and the air.

The film fill design facilitates the formation of a thin water film, which increases the exposure of water to the air, resulting in improved heat transfer efficiency.

Both splash fill and film fill play a crucial role in cooling tower operation by facilitating heat exchange between the water and the air.

The choice of fill type depends on factors such as the specific cooling requirements, the design of the cooling towers, and the environmental conditions in which the tower operates.

How are Cooling Tower Components Built?

Cooling towers can be built in a variety of different ways. The two-counterflow or flow cooling tower is the most common type of cooling tower.

Counter flow cooling towers are the most efficient type of cooling tower & therefore, the most cost-effective design.

The second type of cooling tower is the crossflow cooling tower. Crossflow are best suited for dirty water scenarios where the water conditions are unsuitable for film-type fill.

The Bottom Line

Cooling tower is an important part of many types of machinery. They work by using the evaporation of water to remove heat from the water.

In order to keep your cooling and tower parts in good working condition, it’s important to have a good understanding of all the different parts of cooling tower and how they work together.

If you’re in need of a new cooling tower, a cooling tower upgrade or replacement cooling tower parts and functions for your industrial process, be sure to contact Industrial Cooling Solutions.

We offer various cooling towers that are sure to meet your needs. We also offer a wide range of replacement cooling tower parts and accessories, so you can keep your cooling tower in good working condition.

Vibrations Are Bad For Business

November 30, 2016
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Vibrations Can turn Cooling Towers Into Cooling Nightmares

Hello once again, and welcome back to Industrial Cooling Solutions Inc.’s blog. In our last post we covered variable frequency drives and listed some of the benefits that these devices have for applications in the cooling tower industry. While the benefits of VFDs are pretty straightforward, we thought we would talk about a component of cooling towers that many people outside of the industry never think about: The vibration switch. This tiny little device keeps the whole operation running smoothly, and today it will get the recognition it deserves. We hope that after reading this blog post you will come away with a more confident understand of why vibration switches are so very important.

Feel the Vibrations

To talk about vibration in an industrial setting, we must first define a few terms. Vibration, in the mechanical sense, is the mechanical motion of a machine or machine part away from its equilibrium point. To put it in simpler terms, vibration happens when a part moves back and forth from its intended point of stability. While all machines experience some level of vibration, this motion becomes an issue when it exceeds the allowable safety standards of the given machine. To use an example that most people are familiar with, think of your car’s engine. When you start your car a noticeable vibration is experienced and is totally normal. However, have you ever started your car and noticed too much vibration? If you have then you probably had to get your engine serviced, because an excessive amount of vibration is indicative of engine problems. This same concept applies to any mechanical device, and is especially true in the industrial cooling tower industry.

Cooling Towers are Only as Effective as Their Fans

The Majority of industrial cooling towers use a large fan to circulate air. Whether this fan is placed at the top or the bottom of the tower doesn’t really matter, but what does matter is how efficiently the fan rotates. If a cooling towers fan isn’t rotating at an optimal rate, the tower is not doing the most effective job it can at dissipating heat. Cooling tower fans have rotation issues for multiple reasons, but one of the most common causes of fan failure is excessive vibration. Because these fans rotate at high speeds for extended periods of time, they can run afoul of simple physics. Centrifugal force, the same force that keeps you secured in a rollercoaster when it’s going through a loop, acts upon the fan as it rotates. These fans are designed to handle this force, but even the most well designed mechanical device will experience some issues at one time or another. Over the life of the fan’s operation, centrifugal force slowly but surely warps the equilibrium point of the fan, which in turn causes the fan to vibrate. To mitigate this effect, a vibration switch is installed to monitor the fan at all times.

Vibration Switches are Always Watching

The function of the vibration switch is to monitor the rotation of the fan, and make sure that it is running within the acceptable vibration level specified by the manufacturer. If the vibration switch detects too much vibration, it can be programmed to either slow down the fan’s rotation speed, or halt the fan’s rotation all together. By doing this, the vibration switch prevents the fan from becoming too wobbly and causing potential damage (or complete failure) to the cooling tower. If the vibration levels are considered too severe, maintenance workers can recalibrate the fan and avoid potential issues in the future. With such an important job, the vibration switch is one of the unsung heroes of the cooling tower industry.
If you want to learn more about vibration switches, or are simply interested in cooling towers, give us a visit today at Industrial Cooling Solutions Inc. Our cooling tower experts have the knowledge and skills needed to construct high-quality cooling towers for the industrial sector. With projects spanning multiple countries, no job is too big. We have proven ourselves to be able to handle jobs from simple applications all the way to complex industrial systems. Contact us today to learn more!

November 22, 2016
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Hello, and welcome back to our blog! In our previous posts, we laid down a few basics about industrial cooling towers, such as why they are important and which type works best for a specific industry. At Industrial Cooling Solutions Inc., we understand that not everybody is as well-versed in the systems and parts that make an industrial cooling tower work. In today’s post, we are going to cover one common component of cooling towers: Variable frequency drives.

What is a Variable Frequency Drive?

Variable Frequency Drives, or VFDs for short, are computer controlled, electric motors that are connected to fans located in many industrial cooling towers. The VFDs’ job is to correctly identify the motor rotation of the fan and ensure that it is spinning in the correct direction at all times. To do this, the VFD is started, slows the fan down to zero rotations, and restarts the fan in the correct rotation. The VFD is also responsible for ensuring that the fan is rotating at an optimal speed while in use, and it can be used in emergencies to completely shut down a fan.

Why are VFDs Beneficial?

VFDs have many benefits when it comes to ensuring that cooling towers perform at their maximum efficiency. VFDs are beneficial for cooling towers that are located in cold climates, because they can run the fan at a slower speed than normal. By rotating the fan at a slower speed, the cooling tower’s temperature is raised and ice is prevented from forming on the tower. Conversely, during warmer months, a VFD can automatically run the fan at a higher speed (but still within acceptable safety ranges) to increase cooling efficiency. By doing these things, a VFD helps to reduce energy consumption from the fan, reduces maintenance issues, and helps to keep the cooling tower running as smoothly as possible.

VFDs Sound Cool, But Can’t A Person Do The Same Thing?

While the VFDs’ main function may sound simple (simply controlling the speed of a fan), it is a little more complex than that. While fans can be manually regulated by a worker, a VFD provides a level of control and accuracy that just cannot be replicated by a human. The VFD is always watching, always adjusting, and never gets tired. Additionally, variable frequency drives help to eliminate the need for other cooling tower controls such as electrical brakes, time delay relays, and anti-ratcheting devices. Coupling a VFD with a vibration switch, which identifies any mechanical resonance that occurs at high rotation speeds, can effectively eliminate any issues associated with vibrations caused by the fan. The VFD can achieve this because these vibration speeds can be relayed to the VFD, at which point it will adjust the fan speed to compensate for any unwanted mechanical vibrations.
At Industrial Cooling Solutions Inc., we have the experience, resources, and qualified professionals to handle any industrial cooling tower job. Our past projects speak for themselves, and our footprint can be seen on a global scale. Contact us today to discuss your next cooling tower job, and learn why Industrial Cooling Solutions Inc. is a trusted name in the cooling tower industry.