What are brazed plate heat exchangers?
Brazed Plate Heat Exchangers (BPHEs, sometimes known as plate to plate heat exchangers) are one of the most efficient means to transfer heat from one medium to another. A Brazed Plate Heat Exchanger consists of corrugated plates that combine to create channels through which a hot medium and a cold medium (typically water) can be distributed.
Brazed Plate Heat Exchangers can be used for a range of functions in a heating or cooling system – they can act as condensers, evaporators, oil or gas coolers and be used for other functions that involve the transfer of heating or cooling.
Brazed Plate Heat Exchangers are widely used in many different industries and often in large-scale residential heat networks. They play an important role in delivering air conditioning process and production, refrigeration, data center cooling and residential heating.
Choosing Brazed Plate Heat Exchanger technology for your next heating or cooling project will provide many benefits, including savings in energy and maintenance costs and maximising space.
A brazed plate heat exchanger compared to a shell and tube heat exchanger and a gasket heat exchanger.
Benefits of choosing brazed plate heatexchangers (also known as plate to plate heat exchangers)
- Compact – Our brazed plate heat exchangers are extremely compact compared with other technologies. The carbon footprint can be as little as one tenth that of a shell and tube heat exchanger or half that of a gasket plate heat exchanger.
- Efficient – With no need for gaskets or supporting equipment, about 95% of the material is used to transfer heat. The highly turbulent flow also enables you to use small temperature differences efficiently.
- Reliable – The robust construction requires no gaskets, eliminating their risk of leaking. This means stable thermal and hydraulic performance, with minimal maintenance and operational downtime.
- Flexible – The compact size uses space efficiently and makes system design more flexible. Larger installations can be constructed unit by unit via standard doors and elevators, and it is easy to expand capacity when demand increases.
- Cost-effective – You will save on energy, maintenance, spare parts, and installation. The life-cycle cost over 15-20 years can often be half that of a corresponding gasketed solution.
- Self-cleaning – Our brazed plate heat exchangers are normally self-cleaning, thanks to highly turbulent flows. In applications with a high risk of fouling or scaling, Cleaning in Place is easy without disassembly. Read more about plate heat exchanger cleaning.
- Customized – By combining plate design, materials, and connections from standard components, we keep lead times short while still maximizing output in your specific application.
How to choose brazed plate heat exchangers
We are here to help. Please contact us if you need guidance choosing products and solutions for your project. You can also use our software to do your own calculations on plate heat exchanger sizing.
FAQs
SWEP has pioneered the development of the gasket-free brazed plate heat exchanger (BPHE) which has several clear advantages over the gasket plate to frame heat exchanger. The Brazed Plate Heat Exchanger maximizes the most efficient transfer of energy, with 95% of its content. The life cycle cost over a period of 15-20 years can often be halved compared with gasket-plate solutions, which are built on a frame, require much more material and are thereby less efficient (the additional material does not provide additional heat exchange capability).
SWEP Software Package - SSP – is our unique and world-leading software that has been developed for advanced heat exchange calculations. The software handles single-phase, condenser, evaporator, cascade calculations, two-stage applications and more. Input your data and SSP immediately presents the product concept that best meets your needs.
A brazed plate heat exchanger (BPHE) is normally self-cleaning thanks to highly turbulent flows. In applications with a high risk of fouling or scaling due to unsuitable conditions such as questionable water quality and high temperatures (scaling), chemical cleaning may be necessary to maintain efficiency. In such cases Cleaning in Place (CIP) is suitable, a convenient way of cleansing the interior surfaces of closed systems.
The mediums come into close proximity inside the BPH, on either side of the corrugated plate without mixing, and energy is transferred from one side to the other as they flow side by side.