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People develop a product or service on the basis of customer needs. It revolves around their expectations. When a product is successfully launched, it needs to be upgraded and modified with time.
The trends and technology force the creators to change the market offerings or upgrade the existing ones. The same rule applies to valves. These are used for numerous purposes in industries as well as at home. Different types of valves also got upgraded to provide various utilities with time.
Be it pushing the flow of liquid or materials down the pipe or regulating the flow of water; valves are always in demand. They have different uses like filtering molecular sieve and other items. To serve these uses in the best possible way, people have created different variants of these valves. They can assist in building a floating dock by bettering the water flow.
Several sellers of these valves are operating their business online. You can buy valves at lower prices from such sellers as they provide more valves at a high convenience level. Before buying valves for appropriate usages, a person must have a sound knowledge about different types of valves and which one will best suit their needs.
6 Different Kinds of Valves & Applications
There are majorly six types of valves used in daily routine activities. These valves give a wide spectrum of applications suited for your industrial needs. These types are:
- Gate valves
- Butterfly valves
- Ball valves
- Globe valves
- Check valves
- Needle valves
Gate Valves
Gate valves are those used for opening and closing the gates of water. For this purpose, it is worldwide used in piping systems, be it industrial or residential. A distinct element of such valves is that they are not used for controlling the flow of substances. They are built like a straight pathway. This helps in less obstruction and hurdles between the flow.
They consist of a sliding door that opens or closes the gate for the material. An added advantage of gate valves is that these are one of the cheapest valves with decent benefits. Nowadays, gate valves come with electric and automatic sliding gates, but at a higher price than the manual.
Butterfly valves
You might have come across many manufacturers selling an industrial butterfly valve. These are quarter-turn or rotated valves which are highly acceptable in various uses. It consists of a disc that is attached to a long rod. This rod then dictates the opening and closing of the valve. It rotates the disc at a 45-degree angle to close the valve. Again, the rod rotates the disc to the normal position to open the valve.
It is used to regulate the continuous flow of materials. Materials that have solids in them are transported through this type of valve. They are easy to operate and afford. Handles, gears, and automatic actuators are used to control this type of valve.
Ball Valves
These valves work similarly to butterfly valves, with a quarter-turn rotation. Ball valves have a small in between them like a spherical ball. The drilled hole becomes at 90-degree when the valve is closed.
These are used when slurry, liquids, and dusty materials are used. The rotation of the ball regulates the flow. The main components of a ball valve are rotary ball, bonnet, seats, power source, etc.
Globe Valves
Globe valves are popular for their multifunctionality feature, i.e., regulation of flow and opening & closing of valves. The difference between the lift plug and the side valve seat is used as a measure to know the flow rate control.
This type of valve is suitable for the flow of tight materials like oil. The disc is rotated or moved directly perpendicular to the seat. There is a special feature of this valve due to its shape. Due to its built-up, a high amount of pressure is created within the valve.
Check Valves
Check valves are primarily developed to avoid backflowing (putting materials in the direction of the source) in piping and drainage systems. When the valve gets opened, the flow of materials is directed in a particular direction. But as soon as the direction of the materials and flow is reversed, the check valve gets closed due to pressure creation.
The valve gets closed due to a spring, back pressure, or a check mechanism. They prevent high damage caused by backflow. Therefore these are used in line isolation, different pumps, media injection, head pressure maintenance, etc.
Needle Valves
If infrequent regulation of materials flow exists in the system, or you are looking to make little adjustments, needle valves are the best-suited options. They control the flow with their long needle stemmed structure. They have a variety of applications. These are mainly used in pressure pump governors, advanced automatic combustion systems, and instrumentation control.