Soft Iron Gaskets

[tothepoint]

Plant specifications call out "soft iron" gaskets in many turbine connections. Is there any standard for soft iron gaskets? Different suppliers supply different low carbon steels- all as "soft iron". Grade 1008 cold rolled and annealed is what is currently used. Any input?

 

[metengr]

tothepoint;
We purchase a number of gaskets for out Plant components and I have never seen a gasket material fabrication standard. Our gasket suppliers will give you material and maximum hardness values for the material, but nothing beyond this information. I would suspect each gasket supplier may have their own specfic requirements related to gasket composition and hardness based on experience.

We rely on several gasket suppliers to provide the required gasket material for the intended service conditions. I do know that one supplier that we have used no longer provides "soft iron" gasket material because it is not commerically available. Instead they supply low carbon steel, which has a hardness close to "soft iron" and has worked well for us.

 

[Dhan2]

Try Flexitallic website. They would supply soft metal jacketed gaskets.

 

[11echo]

The only time I ran into "soft iron" gasket was for ring type joints on a high pressure water injection system. And if I recall correctly, these gaskets had to conform to API 6A spec. (having to do with harnesses of materials). Sorry best I can do, had do "dust" off alot of brain cells for this. Good Luck! ...Mark

 

[unclesyd]

Other terms you may want to use is ARMCO Iron or Swedish Iron, there are several others. These are pure iron and are extremely soft. All our Ring Joint Gaskets in in high temperature steam and vaporized oil used ARMCO iron gaskets.
We made gaskets from ARMCO Iron on several different ocasions for steam trubines. We also fabricate sealing and locating rings fron Ring Joint Gaskets for turbines.

 

[jamesl]

ASME B16.20b could be the spec you are looking for. Maximum hardness for "soft iron" RTJ gasket is 90 Brinell.