Skeletons and joints

The oldest evidence of life on Planet Earth dates back some 4 billion years. Since then, Mother Nature’s R&D Department has tried to unravel, through the most ambitious trial-and-error tests, which is the best bionic engineering design to provide animals with more strength and resistance, less fatigue and risk of injury, and better mobility and autonomy.

This Bionics Department developed the skeleton as a system to support and protect a body.

This rigid structure could be on the outside (exoskeleton) or on the inside (endoskeleton).

Ironically, in animals with exoskeletons (a crab or an insect, for example), their armor is their weak point. If their skeleton is broken, the animal has little chance of surviving in their hostile world.

On the other hand, animals with an endoskeleton inside them, such as fish, have their survival exposed to the first hungry predator that comes along.

Using this analogy with nature, LET’S TALK about one of our star products:

The double jacketed gasket is the most commonly used gasket in heat exchangers. This gasket, made entirely by hand, is composed of a soft filler depending on the temperature, pressure or corrosive conditions, generally graphite, KEMMICA® (expanded mica) or KEMICULITE® (exfoliated mica), completely covered by a metal sheet. This architecture offers compressibility and flexibility that makes the gasket adapt securely to the flange, as well as providing greater resistance than a flat metal gasket. These gaskets are very versatile and can be used in a wide range of applications, from the petrochemical industry to the pharmaceutical industry.

The metal-plastic gasket has tried to find more efficient developments, but a gasket that offers the perfect spring effect for the impeccable adaptation to the flange has not yet been achieved. It is to semi-metallic gaskets what crustaceans or insects are to the animal world. An exoskeleton. The skeleton on the outside. An armour.

The problem with the double jacketed gasket is that, up to now, it is totally hand-made. This means that, like everything hand-made (and think of Campurriana biscuits) there are irregularities that can be seen with the naked eye. In these gaskets, until not long ago, variations in the width of the gasket were observed along the perimeter. We have already corrected this defect and together with our gaskets we deliver a certificate that guarantees that the width remains unchanged throughout the piece. Likewise, this certificate also guarantees that the compressibility remains identical at each point of the gasket. We are especially proud of this achievement.

One of the evolutions of metal-plastics is the Toothed Gasket or Kammprofile, which has a similar principle (soft part + hard part) but in reverse. The toothed gasket or kammprofile would be what an endoskeleton (the skeleton inside) is to the animal kingdom. Its design offers a very effective seal, minimising the risk of leaks under high pressure and temperature conditions.

This difference in practice means that, in toothed gaskets, the soft part that goes on the outside (covering) and which is usually made of graphite, Teflon or exfoliated mica (KEMICULITE®), is directly subjected to the pressure, causing its function to be diluted between the teeth of the core of the gasket (the metal), leaving the teeth exposed, and therefore increasing the risk of damage that they can cause to the surface of the flange. In other words, the toothed gasket poses a long-term risk to the equipment.

While it is true that the graphite on the outside, with proper tightening, helps the gasket to adapt to possible irregularities in the flange, it can also contribute to creating such irregularities.

So both gaskets, double jacketed gasket and toothed (or Kammprofile) gaskets, have great advantages, but both also have some disadvantages.

In the case of double jacketed gasket, there is no risk of their “armor” breaking, as has happened to the crab, since the metals that cover the filling are calculated to offer the gasket the necessary compressibility to withstand any tightening under the conditions for which they have been designed.

On the other hand, KAMMPROFILE GASKETS have no more “predator” (in the simile of nature) than a worker who goes too far with the tightening torque and leaves the teeth of the metal core in direct contact with the flange, damaging it. In addition, from that point of tightening the gasket would already lose its recoverability.

This would not happen with double jacketed gasket.

In summary, both double jacketed gasket and Kammprofile gaskets have their own unique advantages, which can be understood through the analogy of exoskeletons and endoskeletons.

Double jacketed gaskets offer strength and versatility, while Kammprofile gaskets excel in efficiency and adaptability.

The choice of both will depend on the specific needs of the application, as well as the environment in which they are used.

Why choose when we can combine the advantages of both joints?

Mother Nature’s bionics department is already so advanced that it has created animals, like the one writing now, that enjoy a skeleton inside to give us freedom of movement, stability, strength and resistance, but it has also provided us in certain parts of the body with an external skeleton that protects vital organs (rib cage, skull…).

Listening to Nature, our star proposal is the HYBRID DOUBLE JACKETED GASKET (with exo-endoskeleton). The so-called F8A.

As we are a factory, we are able to produce in our facilities the double jacketed gasket with graphite, Teflon or KEMMICA® coating, in any design, size and material, in such a way that the spring function and compressibility of the metal-plastic and the total sealing capacity of the graphite, PTFE or mica of the toothed gasket or KAMMPROFILE are used.

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At KEMPCHEN-COMDIFLEX we are manufacturers. We have been manufacturing in Spain for 60 years, so we work under the most demanding standards in practically any size and material, as well as being able to offer emergency service.

60 years manufacturing and marketing sealing, expansion and corrosion products

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