CONSTANT VOLUME AND CONSTANT

PRESSURE HEATING EQUIPMENT:

In industries, we use many types of heating equipment such as follows:
Furnace Thermostat
Heater (electric and water) Humidifier
Heat pump Oven
Boiler Stove

This all equipment work on different conditions such as constant temperature and constant pressure etc.
We will focus on boiler, furnace and heater from these processes in detail.

FURNACE
In furnace heat is generated at a central furnace and is then distributed and delivered to the conditioned
space via a duct system. A properly designed heating system will generate quiet, filtered, and
comfortable air into the conditioned zone.
Fuel:
There are three types of fossil fuel heating systems predominantly available on the market today. These
include natural gas, liquefied petroleum (LP) and fuel oil forced-air furnaces. Natural gas is
predominantly used as the preferred fuel. The fuel is mixed with the air to have combustion, the amount
of the air is very important for complete combustion of the furnace, O2 is a measure of excess air and
CO is a measure of the quality of combustion. Appropriate equivalence ratio should be chosen for
the better combustion. In addition to this the initial pressure should be decreased, the initial temperature
should be increased.
Furnace at constant volume:
Constant volume systems provide each zone with a fixed airflow rate at a constant temperature. The
airflow rate is based on the design. The ducting and air handling system are sized to match heat
from equipment. Constant volume systems can heat and cool simultaneously. They require some form
of centralized air handling units. Most of them can use either air or water side economizers to
take advantage of free cooling during mild weather. Since constant volume with reheat systems are
simultaneous heating and cooling systems, they are typically not energy efficient. Fan work is also very
high since the fan capacity is based on the connected load and there is no variation in air volume at part
load. Constant volume uses more fan power.
Furnace at constant pressure:
The constant pressure furnace design has been used primarily in the U.S. while the variable pressure
design has been dominant in Europe. The constant pressure furnace utilizes tubes that are vertically
oriented. The less costly vertical tube arrangement must operate at constant pressure, utilizes multiple
passes and mixes, does not permit daily on/off cycling and exhibits a slightly higher pressure drop.
Installations of the constant pressure furnace are thermally inefficient but low fuel cost makes them
reasonably economical. Constant pressure design is high efficiency. In this type of furnace inlet
air pressure must be above the furnace pressure. Ignition of main burners under furnace pressures up to
10 psig is smooth and stable.

TURBINE
The gas turbine is an internal combustion engine that uses air as the working fluid. The engine extracts
chemical energy from fuel and converts it to mechanical energy using the gaseous energy of the working
fluid (air) to drive the engine and propeller.
Fuel:
There are regional economic and political incentives for using fuel in the gas turbine. The power
industry will need to institute design changes to accommodate these fuels.
The combustion gas turbine being installed in many of today’s natural gas fuelled
power plants consist of inlet section, compressor, combustion system, and turbine, exhaust system, and
exhaust diffuser. Fuel enters the combustion chambers where it mixes with air. The amount of both fuel
and air should be per the air-fuel ratio required by gas turbines
Turbine at constant volume:
Gas Turbines are constant volume machines. At a given shaft speed they always move the same volume
of air. But the power output of a turbine depends on the flow of mass through it. At a constant speed,
the compressor pumps a constant volume of air into the engine, if the density of the air decreases, the
same volume of air will contain less mass, so less power is produced. If air density increases, power
output also increases as the air mass flow increases for the same volume of air. This is precisely the
reason why on hot days, when air is less dense, power output falls off. A rise of one degree Centigrade
temperature of Inlet air decreases the power output by 1% and at the same time heartrate of the turbine
also goes up.
Turbine at constant pressure:
As in the constant volume gas turbine if the temperature of air rises, the power output of the Gas Turbine
falls. To increase the efficiency more power is required to compress warmer air. For this condition the
following three parameters are made to be constant.

 Site altitude i.e. atmospheric pressure

 Inlet pressure drop in the filters and intake system
 Outlet pressure drop in the HRSG (Heat Recovery Steam Generator) By this we obtain a higher
output and improved efficiency.
 BOILER
A boiler is a closed vessel in which water or other fluid is heated. The heated or vaporized fluid exits
the boiler for use in various processes or heating applications. Mainly it is a device used to create steam
by applying heat energy to water. Although the definitions are somewhat flexible, it can be said
that older steam generators were commonly termed boilers and worked at low to medium pressure (1-
300 psi/0.069 –20.684 bar;6.895–2,068.427kPa)but, at pressures above this, it is more usual to speak
of a steam generator. An industrial boiler originally used for supplying steam to an engine. A boiler or
steam generator is used wherever a source of steam is required. The form and size depends on the
application: mobile steam engines such as locomotives, portable and steam-powered road vehicles
typically use a smaller boiler that forms an integral part of the vehicle; stationary steam engines,
industrial installations and power stations will usually have a larger separate steam generating facility
connected to the point-of-use by piping
Fuel:
The source of heat for a boiler is combustion of any of several fuels, such as wood, coal, oil, or natural
gas. Electric steam boilers use resistance- or immersion-type heating elements. Nuclear fission is also
used as a heat source for generating steam. Heat recovery steam generators (HRSGs) use the heat
rejected from other processes such as gas turbines.
Boiler at Constant Pressure:
When the boiler is at constant pressure so for boiling, we must raise the vapor pressure to atmospheric
pressure so for doing this we must give more amount of heat due to raise in volume so for this
heat energy is lost to change in volume.
Boiler at Constant Volume:
When the boiler works at constant volume so for boiling we must raise the vapor pressure to the pressure
built in the boiler as the volume is constant the pressure raise and due to that temperature raises much
more than boiler at constant pressure.

REFERENCES:
 https://www.scribd.com/document/88749658/Heating-equipments
 https://www.boundless.com/physics/textbooks/boundless-physics-textbook/thermodynamics-
14/the-first-law-of-thermodynamics-117/constant-pressure-and-volume-407-5047/