Material success for Garlock seal
15 Oct 2002
Garlock Sealing Technology's Ultra-Flex seal, which was designed jointly with the French atomic energy commission, CEA, combines tight sealing properties with resistance to extreme conditions.
The seal has an open 'C' cross-section made from gold, aluminium, silver or copper formed over a core made from the specialist alloy Inconel.
The 'C' section deforms as the seal is loaded, pushing together two opposing offset ridges on the sealing face.
The arrangement can achieve sealing tightness of 1 x 10-9 cc/sec He with clamping pressures equivalent to elastomeric seals, Garlock says.
