Polytechnic University of the Philippines

Department of Mechanical Engineering

ME Instrumentation
&
Control Engineering
GROUP 15
STEAM INJECTOR

TOBONGBANUA, JANNEL M.
SEMENTILLA, ROLAND P.
MARTIN, JOHN DARWIN PAUL F.

BSME 4-2
STEAM INJECTOR
 The injector is a device for delivering feed water into the boiler. It was invented by Henri Giffard, a
French engineer in 1858 and patented in the UK by Messrs Sharp Stewart & Co. of Glasgow.
  The injector is the instrument used to feed water into the boilers. It is usually employed where space is
not available to implement a feed pump. Used for vertical and locomotive boilers.
 An injector is a steam jet device by means of which water from the tender of the locomotive can be forced
into the boiler against the boiler pressure
 Injectors may be of the lifting type or of the non-lifting type, or may operate on a combination of both the
lifting and non-lifting designs.

HSTORY
The injector was invented by Henri
Giffard for the steam locomotive and patented in the United Kingdom by Messrs
Sharp Stewart & Co. of Glasgow.
 Baptiste Jules Henri Jacques Giffard
(8 February 1825 – 14 April 1882) was a French engineer. In 1858 he invented the
steam injector

PARTS

AND
FUNCTIONS
Steam Pipe

 Steam from the boiler enters the injector

through steam pipe

Water pipe

 Water from the reservoir that was sucked by

the vacuum pressure enters the injector through water pipe.

Steam Cone
  It increases the velocity of the steam that enters the injector and decreases its pressure.

Combining Cone

 Combining cone greatly increases the velocity sufficient for the feed water to jump the overflow gap into the
delivery cone.

Delivery Cone

 Delivery cone converts the velocity energy into pressure energy which is slightly higher than boiler pressure
and allows the clack (non-return) valve to open to allow the feed water into the boiler.

Overflow

 An overflow is required for excess steam or water to discharge, especially during starting; if the injector
cannot initially overcome boiler pressure, the overflow allows the injector to continue to draw water and
steam.

Check valve

 There is at least one check valve (called a "clack valve" in locomotives because of the distinctive noise it
makes) between the exit of the injector and the boiler to prevent back flow, and usually a valve to prevent
air being sucked in at the overflow.

TYPES OF INJECTOR

There are two types of Injector:

1. LIFTING INJECTORS - operate with high-pressure steam from the boiler.

2. NON-LIFTING INJECTORS - are designed to operate with the exhaust steam from the cylinders

MODERN USES
The use of injectors (or ejectors) in various industrial applications has become quite common due to their relative
simplicity and adaptability. For example:

 To inject chemicals into the boiler drums of small, stationary, low pressure boilers. In large, high-pressure
modern boilers, usage of injectors for chemical dosing is not possible due to their limited outlet pressures.
 In thermal power stations, they are used for the removal of the boiler bottom ash, the removal of fly ash from
the hoppers of the electrostatic precipitators used to remove that ash from the boiler flue gas, and for drawing
a vacuum pressure in steam turbine exhaust condensers.
 Jet pumps have been used in boiling water nuclear reactors to circulate the coolant fluid.
 For use in producing a vacuum pressure in steam jet cooling systems.
 For enhanced oil recovery processes in the oil & gas Industry.
 For the bulk handling of grains or other granular or powdered materials.
 The construction industry uses them for pumping turbid water and slurries.
 Eductors are used in ships to pump residual ballast water, or cargo oil which cannot be removed using
centrifugal pumps due to loss of suction head and may damage the centrifugal pump if run dry, which may be
caused due to trim or list of the ship.
  Eductors are used on-board ships to pump out bilges, since using centrifugal pump would not be feasible as
the suction head may be lost frequently.
 Some aircraft (mostly earlier designs) use an ejector attached to the fuselage to provide vacuum for
gyroscopic instruments such as an attitude indicator (artificial horizon).
 Eductors are used in aircraft fuel systems as transfer pumps; fluid flow from an engine-mounted mechanical
pump can be delivered to a fuel tank-mounted eductor to transfer fuel from that tank.
 Aspirators are vacuum pumps based on the same operating principle and are used in laboratories to create a
partial vacuum and for medical use in suction of mucus or bodily fluids.
 Water eductors are water pumps used for dredging silt and panning for gold, they're used because they can
handle the highly abrasive mixtures quite well.
 To create vacuum system in vacuum distillation unit (oil refinery)

HOW IT WORKS

1. The steam is taken from the boiler is send to the injector with high pressure and with low velocity to the
injector.
2. The flow is the directed to the converging, diverging steam cone. In this cones converging section, the steam
velocity is increased to speed of the sound. At the diverging section, the pressure further reduced and
converted to the kinetic energy where steam is moving faster than the speed of the sound. By the time steam
lives the cone, speed of the steam is much faster than the speed of sound, but its pressure is below the
atmospheric pressure.
3. The low pressure created at the exit of the steam cone causes the water in the reservoir to be sucked in to this
vacuum.
4. The water leaving steam cone with high velocity enters to the combining cone. It is called combining cone,
because the steam is also sucking large amount of water from reservoir. During this combining process, steam
begin to condense and the water begin to get warmer. This mixing and condensing flow proses is show with
purple background. During combining process, speed of water was increasing due to hammer effect of the
steam jet, but steam was disappearing from the flow as water. Further narrowing the combining cone
increases the speed of water further.
5. The water jet living the combining cone is pushed into the delivery cone. It is called the delivery cone,
because it leads the flow toward to the boiler. Before water reaching to the boiler, the flow velocity is reduced
due to diverging shape of the delivery cone. Reduced speed increases the flow pressure above the boiler
pressure and this allow the feed water to be delivered to the boiler.
6. What lays in between combining cone and the delivery cone is overflow chamber. Adding this chamber into
the steam injector was ingenuity of steam injector inventor Henri Giffard. This chamber and overflow pipe
allowed the excess water to be send back to reservoir and preventing to steam injector to choke, especially
when it is starting to operate the first time. It allowed the injector to operate smoothly.