Frequent Heat Exchanger Leakage? Watch Out for These Three Gasket Selection Pitfalls

Frequent leakage of plate heat exchangers is a major challenge for factory maintenance teams. Every leak necessitates equipment shutdown, drainage, disassembly, gasket replacement and reassembly, resulting in production downtime, higher labor costs and potential safety risks.

Many technicians tend to attribute leakage to plate corrosion or improper clamping clearance. However, industry data indicates that over 60% of such failures stem from improper gasket selection. We have summarized three common pitfalls for your reference.

Wrong Material Selection: Using EPDM for Oil-bearing Media

EPDM features outstanding resistance to hot water, steam, dilute acid, alkali and refrigerants, ideal for HVAC and heating systems. Yet it performs poorly against oils. When exposed to mineral oil, lubricant or oily fluids, EPDM will swell, soften and lose elasticity, causing seal failure. Visible signs include thickened, deformed gaskets squeezed out of grooves and sticking to plates. For oil-contained media, NBR (nitrile rubber) is the reliable choice, thanks to its excellent oil resistance.

Improper Hardness and Compression Ratio

Gasket hardness is measured by Shore A. Gaskets softer than 60 Shore A tend to deform permanently under compression and lose resilience. Those harder than 90 Shore A cannot fully fill tiny gaps between plates, and require excessive clamping force that may damage plates. For regular working conditions, 70–80 Shore A is recommended for EPDM and NBR, while FKM adopts 75–85 Shore A. Extreme working conditions require professional parameter evaluation.

Inappropriate Structure for Frequent Maintenance

Bonded gaskets are hard to detach. For food, pharmaceutical and wastewater sectors where regular disassembly and cleaning are required, removing old glue, cleaning grooves and re-gluing drastically extend downtime and may trigger secondary leakage. Instead, clip-on/snap-on gaskets are the optimal solution. Tool-free assembly and disassembly cuts maintenance time by over 70%, and eliminates corrosion risks from adhesives.

Choosing the right gasket matching your operating conditions is the key to long-term reliable sealing. Our professional solutions cover diverse materials, hardness grades and structural designs, helping you tackle leakage troubles and keep your equipment running smoothly all year round.