New seal water solutions for the paper industry

The usage of traditional gland packings is decreasing in paper mills. Dynamic seals and single mechanical seals, which improve the sealing efficiency and total seal costs in long term are slowly replacing packings. However in paper mills there is machinery, in which the double acting mechanical seals are the most efficient sealing solution. These are the bigger process pumps, refiners, agitators, pulpers, screens and colour kitchen pumps. These seals will require also the seal water. Optimising of seal water consumption is not only to reduce the seal water flow to minimum, but also to ensure that the quality of the seal water fulfils the requirements and the delivery of water is reliable enough. This is important particularly in paper and pulp industry, where 59 % of sea failures are related to the quality or flow control of seal water ( Fig 1). [GRAPHICS] Without a good seal water system, it is not possible to maximise the seal lifetime or minimise the total sealing costs.