Packing Ring Relief Openings for Pressure-Balanced Sealing
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Solution Overview
Problem
Piston compressors in cross-head design face challenges with sealing efficiency due to wear and pressure variations, leading to extrusion and leakage issues, especially at higher pressures, where conventional packing rings suffer from uneven wear and instability.
Innovation Solution
A packing ring design with at least three relief openings on each segment, extending from the inner circumferential surface to the outer circumferential surface, providing pressure compensation and adaptability to wear, and optionally including wear openings and axial grooves for improved structural rigidity and friction reduction.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If conventional packing rings are used without relief openings, then the structure is simple and manufacturing is easy, but pressure distribution is uneven causing extrusion and reduced service life
Solution Approach 1:
The packing ring incorporates relief openings that create a controlled porous structure, allowing pressure equalization between the high-pressure compression space and the low-pressure crankcase. This porous design prevents extrusion while maintaining sealing effectiveness, directly resolving the contradiction between reliability and structural simplicity.
Solution Approach 2:
The packing ring is divided into multiple segments with individual relief openings, allowing each segment to independently manage pressure distribution. This segmentation enables the ring to adapt to wear and maintain sealing under varying pressure conditions, improving reliability without requiring complex overall restructuring.
2Duration of action of moving object
If packing rings are subjected to high cylinder pressure without pressure compensation, then sealing force is maintained, but uneven wear occurs and service life is reduced
Solution Approach 1:
The relief openings fundamentally change the pressure parameter distribution within the packing ring, equalizing pressure between high and low pressure zones. This parameter change prevents the uneven wear caused by pressure differentials, extending service life while maintaining manufacturing simplicity.
3Reliability
If multiple packing rings are arranged axially in series to increase service life, then reliability improves, but device complexity and axial length increase
Solution Approach 1:
The relief opening design merges the functions of multiple packing rings into a single ring by enabling pressure equalization across the entire ring structure. This combination allows one ring to perform the work of multiple rings, reducing axial length while maintaining or improving reliability.
4Adaptability or versatility
If radially and tangentially cut ring shapes are used to compensate for wear, then automatic readjustment is enabled, but sealing effectiveness is lost in the crank-side re-expansion phase
Solution Approach 1:
The relief openings change the pressure parameter distribution within the ring, equalizing pressure between the inner and outer circumferential surfaces. This pressure equalization prevents the sealing effectiveness loss that occurs in conventional cut rings during crank-side re-expansion, while maintaining wear compensation capabilities.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
The design enhances sealing efficiency by uniformly distributing pressure, reducing wear, and maintaining the sealing effect over longer periods, while allowing for flexible adaptation to changing conditions and pressures, thus extending the service life of the packing rings.
Implementation Method 1
the packing ring enables a pressure compensation between a high pressure applied to the outer circumferential surface and the second axial ring end and a lower pressure relative thereto applied to the first axial ring end
Implementation Method 2
The relief openings each have a first relief opening end opening into the radially inside inner circumferential surface of the ring segment... enabling a pressure compensation... reducing wear
Data Source
AI summary
Various embodiments of the present disclosure are directed to packing rings. In one example embodiment, a packing ring is disclosed including first and second axial ring ends, at least three ring segments, and at least three relief openings. The at least three relief openings each have a first relief opening end opening into the radially inside inner circumferential surface of the ring segment. The first relief opening ends of two relief openings arranged adjacent to one another in the circumferential direction are spaced apart from one another at a relief opening circumferential distance. The first relief opening ends are closer in the axial direction to the first axial ring end than to the second axial ring end and are spaced apart at a relief opening axial distance from the first axial ring end, which is 4% to 20% of the axial ring width of the ring segment.