EXPERT LEVEL:
Beginner
LENGTH:
7:22
INSTRUCTOR:
Miguel Vita, Freudenberg Hydraulic Division
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Hi everybody. Welcome to white papers on whiteboard. My name is Miguel Vita. I work for Freudenberg in the hydraulic accumulator division. I was invited today by our partners ESP International to talk about hydraulic accumulators.
We decided to start with the basics:
What is an accumulator?
How can I use an accumulator?
What are the different technologies that we have on an accumulator?
Let’s start with – “What is an Accumulator?” Think of an air balloon inserted into a bucket and apply a force to the balloon. You increase the pressure on the airside of the balloon. This is the basic principle of an accumulator.
You have an accumulator with a hard shell. Normally carbon steel – very similar to the bucket that I showed you before, and you have an elastomeric diaphragm. This elastomeric diaphragm will make a barrier to a pre-charged nitrogen section. You can compare the pre-charged nitrogen with the air that you have in your balloon.
The port is connected to the hydraulic system. To the hydraulic system, we will apply pressure in this portion and will be translated on the same action that you have with this Force. So basically, when you have the hydraulic system, you increase the pressure in the nitrogen area.
We have here a schematic of a hydraulic system.
And we have added an accumulator in the system.
When the hydraulic system has no pressure, you have the pre-charge of the nitrogen using the whole cavity of the accumulator.
For example:
You have a shovel on your tractor and the shovel hits a stone. You have a huge force being applied here that will increase the pressure in the whole system. This pressurized oil will move to the accumulator and will increase the nitrogen pressure. So, this nitrogen inside the accumulator will work as a cushion. You have dampened the system using an accumulator.
And here we come to the three different types of accumulators. We have the bladder, diaphragm, and the piston type of accumulators.
1. BLADDER ACCUMULATOR
The Bladder is the bread-and-butter. You can use bladder accumulators everywhere. Most of the hydraulic systems use bladder accumulators.
Those accumulators are used in pulsation dampening where you have high frequency, especially in a small amplitude. A lot of applications, right? But this type of accumulator has a restriction. The bladder has a vulcanized seam, and this is the weak point of the bladder system. If you have high frequency and high cycle demand, you can have a rupture in this seam. This is the restriction of this type of accumulator.
2. DIAPHRAGM ACCUMULATOR
Then we can go to the diaphragm type accumulator.
Very similar applications as the bladder type accumulator. However, the diaphragm accumulator has an advantage.
Since you don’t have a seam in the diaphragm, you don’t have the restrictions that you have with the bladder type accumulator.
So applications pretty much the same, but this one is really a reliable accumulator, especially when you have high cycle demands. Applications with 1 million, 2 million, 3 million cycle demands – this is where to use a diaphragm accumulator.
3. PISTON ACCUMULATOR
But really you don’t have limits for this type of accumulator.
Since you machine the accumulator, you can make it in any size. You can make accumulators with a quarter gallon. You can make accumulators with 300 gallons. You can make accumulators going to 40,000 PSI.
Custom ports, custom design, and materials so the piston accumulator is really for limited applications where you can make custom design accumulators.
Thank you.