What is an Immersion Heater?
So to get straight to the point, what is an Immersion Heater? Immersion heaters are primarily used for direct heating of water, oil, solvents, or gases. The word immersion means the action of immersing someone or something in a liquid. Since we will be talking about immersion heaters in specific, we are referring to a heater that is immersed in a liquid with the intention of heating that liquid. Since this type of heater comes in direct contact with what it is heating, and all of the heat is generated within the liquid, making immersion heaters almost 100% energy efficient.
Types of Immersion Heater
Heatrex immersion heaters are built with tubular electric resistance elements welded or soldered to an ANSI flange, custom fabricated rectangular flange, or NPT pipe thread fitting.
Flange-mounted Immersion Heaters
Flanged immersion heaters are made up of hairpin bent tubular elements that are welded into a flange. As one of the most popularly used heaters for heating liquids, the flange heater is bolted to a matching flange that is welded to the wall or nozzle of the tank. This type of immersion heater is easily monitored and controlled. Install this heater within holding and storage tanks.
Pipe thread (screw plug) Immersion Heaters
Pipe thread immersion heaters are made up of hairpin bent tubular elements that are welded into a screw plug. This type of immersion heater is ideal for freeze protection and process water heating. Like the flange immersion heaters, pipe thread immersion heaters are easily controlled and compact. Install this heater in the piping of circulating fluid systems.
Heater Life
Although regular maintenance is critical for the life of any heater, their are two critical factors that affect an immersion heater’s life including watt density and sheath material.
The Watt Density– determines heater operating temperatures for a given set of fluid conditions and varies with fluid temperature.
Sheath Material– determines the rate of corrosion and varies with fluid temperature.
- For more information on the recommendations for sheath materials please refer to our selection guide here.
Immersion heaters are available for heating anything from plain water to corrosive liquids to highly viscous oils. Since Heatrex specializes in building custom industrial heating equipment, we can review your applications and needs that are out of the ordinary. Contact us today at www.heatrex.com.