Control Valves

Control valve
Process plants consist of hundreds, or even thousands, of control loops all
networked together. Each of these control loops is designed to keep some important
process variable such as pressure, flow, level, temperature, etc. within a required
operating range to ensure the quality of the end product. To reduce the effect of
these load disturbances, sensors and transmitters collect information about the
process variable and its relationship to some desired set point. A controller then
processes this information and decides what must be done to get the process
variable back to where it should be after a load disturbance occurs. When all the
measuring, comparing, and calculating are done, some type of final control element
must implement the strategy selected by the controller. The most common final
control element in the process control industries is the control valve. The control
valve manipulates a flowing fluid, such as gas, steam, water, or chemical
compounds, to compensate for the load disturbance and keep the regulated process
variable as close as possible to the desired set point.

Control valve construction

The control valve consists of an actuator and a valve. The valve itself
is divided into the body and the trim.

VALVE BODY:
The body consists of a housing for mounting the actuator and connections for
attachment of the valve to a supply line and a delivery line.
TRIM:
The trim, which is enclosed within the body, consists of a plug, a valve seat, and a
valve stem.
ACTUATOR:
The actuator moves the valve stem as the pressure on a spring-loaded diaphragm
changes. A pneumatic, hydraulic, or electrically powered device that supplies force
and motion to open or close a valve.
STEM:
The stem moves a plug in a valve seat to change the resistance to flow through the
valve. When a valve is supplied by the manufacturer, the actuator and the valve are
attached to each other to form one unit.

PLUG:
The movable part of the valve that is positioned in the flow path to
modify the rate of flow through the valve.
SEAT:
The area of contact between the plug and its mating surface that
establishes valve shut-off.
PACKING:
Most valves use some form of packing to prevent leakage from the space
between the stem and the bonnet. Packing is commonly a fibrous
material (such as flax) or another compound (such as teflon) that forms a
seal between the internal parts of a valve and the outside where the stem
extends through the body.

For the control valve shown in Fig. 191 , an increase in signal pressure above the
diaphragm exerts a force on the diaphragm which causes the stem to move
down; this causes the cross-sectional area for flow between the plug and the seat
to decrease, thereby reducing or throttling the flow. Such valve action is called
air-to-close (AC) action. The reverse action, air-to-open (AO), can be accomplished
by designing the actuator so that pressure is applied to the underside of the
diaphragm, for which case an increase in pressure to the valve raises the stem.
An alternate method to reverse the valve action is to leave the actuator as shown
in Fig. 191 and to invert the plug on the stem and place it under the valve seat.
In general, selection of the type of valve (AO or AC) is made based on safety
considerations. We would like the valve to fail in a safe position for the process in
the event of a loss of air pressure. For example, if the control valve is controlling
the inlet flow of cooling water to a cooling jacket on an exothermic chemical
reactor, we would like the valve to fail in the open position so that we do not lose
coolant flow. Thus, we would select an air-to- close (AC) valve.

VALVE CHARACTERISTICS
The function of a control valve is to vary the flow of
fluid through the valve by means of a change of
pressure to the valve top. The relation between the
flow through the valve and the valve stem position (or
lift ) is called the valve characteristic, which can be
conveniently described
byvalve
means
of a graph
as shown
Inherent
characteristics
(pressure
drop
is constant).
in Figure where across
threevalve
types
of characteristics are
I: Linear
illustrated.

II: increasing sensitivity (e.g., equal-percentage

valve),
and III: decreasing sensitivity (e.g., square root
valve).

In general, the flow through a control valve for a specific fluid at a

given temperature can be expressed as
q = f1 (L, p0 , p1 )
q = volumetric flow rate
L = valve stem position (or lift)
P0 = upstream pressure
p1 = downstream pressure
The inherent valve characteristic is determined for fixed values of p0
and p1 , for which above equation becomes:
q = f2 (L)

or, in other words, the flow is a function of the valve

stem position. For convenience, let

The types of valve characteristics can be defined

in terms of the sensitivity of the valve, which is
simply the fractional change in flow to the
fractional change in stem position for fixed
upstream
and
downstream
pressures:
mathematically, sensitivity may be written
Sensitivity = df/dx

In terms of valve characteristics, valves can be divided into three types:

decreasing sensitivity (square root or quick-opening)
Linear
increasing sensitivity (equal-percentage).
Where the fractional flow f ( x ) is plotted against fractional lift x. For the
decreasing sensitivity type, the sensitivity (or slope) decreases with
increasing flow. For the linear type, the sensitivity is constant and the
characteristic curve is a straight line. For the increasing sensitivity type,
the sensitivity increases with flow. Valve characteristic curves, such as
the ones shown in Fig. 193 , can be obtained experimentally for any
valve by measuring the flow through the valve as a function of lift (or
valve-top pressure) under conditions of constant upstream and
downstream pressures. Two types of valves that are widely used are the
linear valve and the equal percentage valve.

Linear: Equal increments of travel provide equal increments of flow. For

instance, at 50 percent of valve plug travel the flow rate is of 50 percent
of maximum flow rate.
Quick Opening Characteristic: An inherent flow characteristic in which
a maximum flow coefficient is achieved with minimal closure member
travel. The curve is basically linear through the 40 percent of valve plug
travel and then flattens to indicate little increase in flow rate as travel
approaches the wide open position
Equal Percentage Characteristic :
An inherent flow characteristic that, for equal increments of rated travel,
will ideally give equal percentage changes of the flow.

Valve sizing
To specify the size of a valve in terms of its capacity,
the following equation is used: