Advanced Analysis Further Improves Innovative Valve Design

Actuation Lab’s innovative Dragonfly Valve eliminates the environmental impact and safety hazards of gas leaks, which are frequently found in traditional valves. Actuation Lab has performed studies that indicate around 93 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent warming gas (methane) is emitted from leaking valve stems every year. Solving this stem leakage problem would have the same climate impact as removing all the cars and trucks from UK roads!  Leakage of gases like hydrogen, with its wide explosive limits (4-75%) is also a great motivator for the use of inherently leak free stemless valves. With many developers of hydrogen systems exploring containerised solutions, it takes only a small leak to trigger gas alarms in these confined spaces, leading to costly shutdowns.

Actuation Lab wanted to further develop their fully sealed zero-emission stemless valve to make it suitable for modulating control applications, such as flow control valves at pressure reduction stations in the gas network. Rather than simply adapting existing designs for ball valve control trims to work within the Dragonfly Valve (which is based on an eccentric ball valve design), it was decided to explore an entirely new concept for trim design, the Dragon Whisperer Trim, that aimed to meet required control and noise performance targets, while having minimal impact on maximum flow capacity. This design provides valve users with a smaller and more cost-effective solution than previously available. 

The team collaborated with PDL, the valve engineering analysis experts, who have a huge breadth and depth of valve expertise combined with extensive experience spanning two decades of using advanced engineering software to successfully deliver technical solutions to complex engineering problems. 

Flow coefficient correlation for CFD analysis and physical testing.

PDL were able to provide specialist Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) expertise to support Actuation Lab in developing their valve and trim designs. PDL analysts calculated flow capacity metrics such as flow coefficient (Cv) in accordance with ISA 75.01. They used iterative analysis, which allowed results to be reached swiftly and efficiently, compared to relying solely on physical testing, with additional modelling calculating the choked flow and general flow split behaviour between various paths to further understand the valve trim design. PDL also developed analytical tools for noise predictions to aid future design work by the Actuation Lab team. 

The flow coefficients, which were calculated for multiple design iterations of the control valve, showed a strong correlation between PDL’s CFD calculations and Actuation Lab’s physical testing measurements, giving the team full confidence in the design before manufacturing. 

To find out more about this exciting valve project, connect with Michael Dicker, CTO, Actuation Lab or Eddy Winters, Business Development Manager, PDL.

Actuation Lab

• Telephone: + 44 (0) 1 172 441 847
• Email:  contact@actuationlab.com 
• Website: www.actuationlab.com

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