There are a large number of valves and valve configurations to fit all services and types of conditions; different uses (on/off, control), different fluids (liquid, gas etc; combustible, toxic, corrosive etc) different materials and different pressure and temperature conditions. Valves are for starting or stopping flow, regulating or throttling flow, preventing back flow or relieving and regulating pressure in fluid or gaseous handling applications.

Because with their excellent operating characteristics, ball valves can be used for the broadest spectrum of isolation applications and come in a wide range of sizes and materials are available in full fl ow and full through conduit. Advantages - quick acting, straight through fl ow in both direction, low pressure drop, bubble tight turned off & operating torque, easily actuated. Disadvantages - temperature limitiations on seating material, long “relative” in the flesh dimension.

Gate valves might have either a rising or non-rising stem design. Rising stems are attached straight to the gate and supply a visual indicator with the valve position. Non-rising stems are likely to be threaded in the upper part from the gate where you can pointer threaded on the top to indicate position. Non-rising stem designs are ideally suited to applications where vertical space is bound, in well applications and where scraping/pigging is not required.

Gate valves are intended with a sealing unit use a tight seal round the stem. Our unique Single Loaded Spring (SLS) stem seal design, used exclusively on WKM Saf-T-Seal and Pow-R-Seal gate valves, provides superior leak protection plus a self-adjusting seal created to reduce maintenance.

One from the advantages of gate valves is pressure drop across a gate valve is incredibly low if it's fully open. They can be used for bi-directional action and therefore are useful as on-off valves. Gate valves do, however, desire a large force to work and large sized valves need automatic actuators. They’re not quick to open up or close, and occupy more space, when compared with some other valves. Thermal expansion and shrinking may lead to unwanted leakage in a few gate valves that happen to be exposed to hot temperature fluctuations.

The benefits of knife gate valves are that they’re cheap, an easy task to actuate, and lightweight. One in the most notable disadvantages of knife gate valves is they’re recognized to have low-pressure limitations. This makes them less desirable for usage in applications which require cleanliness or sanitary conditions.