Don't Risk Equipment or Safety: Freeze Protect Your Plant Now

industrial heat tracing and freeze protection
Don't let this happen at your plant.
Winter is here in its full glory. Plant engineers and plant maintenance have to pay special care in preventing freezing in pipelines, tanks, Vessels, conveyors, and impulse lines.  The cold temperatures in the Mid-Atlantic can often damage or destroy process equipment and it's valuable contents. Most commonly, pipes, instrumentation, and valves are the vulnerable items affected by the sudden drop in temperatures, causing devastating consequences, including costly downtime and unplanned outages. But there's also safety issues to be considered with snow and ice build up, so attention must be paid to snow and ice melting.

Main Categories for Industrial Heat Tracing


  • Industrial Pipe Tracing Cable
  • Industrial Tank and Vessel Heating
  • Industrial Snow Melting
  • Industrial Roof Gutter Deicing

Responsible facility management includes protecting buildings and equipment against freeze damage. There are many items in any given manufacturing plant to protect, including piping systems, process instrumentation, holding tanks, transfer vessels, and valves. For each of these items, there's a good freeze protection solution to be applied. Here are some of the more common heat tracing products used in these applications.
Self-regulating Heat Tracing Cable

Self-regulating Heat Tracing Cable

Constant Wattage Heat Tracing CableThese self-regulating, cut-to-length cables are normally installed in commercial and light industrial applications, to maintain pipe temperature and/or prevent freezing. These heating cables are available in 120 and 240 voltages and are designed for use in ordinary or hazardous locations (with proper selections and application). Typical applications for this product are freeze protection and low watt density process temperature systems such as product pipelines, fire protection, process water and dust suppression systems.

MI (Mineral Insulated) CableConstant Wattage Heat Tracing Cable

Constant wattage heater cable is ideal for use in maintaining fluid flow under low ambient conditions. The product is used for freeze protection and process temperature maintenance systems such as product pipelines, process water, dust suppression systems, lube oil and condensate return.

MI (Mineral Insulated) Cable

MI Cable is a metal sheathed cable that uses a metallic conductor as the heating element. It is custom designed and fabricated for specific applications. MI Cable is a high performance, industrial grade heat tracing cable used for applications requiring high temperature exposure, immunity to stress corrosion, high maintain temperature, under tank heating (cryogenic tanks), high power output, constant power output over entire, rugged cable construction heater length, and extended heater life.

It is critical to consider the specific application requirements for any heat tracing application. The following checklist always needs to be clearly understood:

  • The mass and material of the item being traced
  • Insulation availability - type and thickness
  • Temperature to be maintained
  • Minimum ambient temperature
  • Minimum start-up temperature
  • Available supply voltage
  • The chemical environment - expose
  • Maximum intermittent exposure temperature
  • Electrical area classification

Always share your heat tracing requirements and challenges with a process heating specialist. There are many options and product variants from which to choose. A consultation with an expert can help direct you to the safest, most efficient, and most cost effective solution.

Happy Holidays from Ives Equipment

"Christmas gift suggestions: To your enemy, forgiveness. To an opponent, tolerance. To a friend, your heart. To a customer, service. To all, charity. To every child, a good example. To yourself, respect." — Oren Arnold

The Sensidyne SensAir CMB Poison Resistant Catalytic Bead Gas Detector


SensAir CMB, by leading gas detection equipment manufacturer Sensidyne, is an industrial grade, cost effective, fixed point gas detector with a highly poison resistant catalytic bead sensor.

The SensAir Gas Detector is a single-point device capable of detecting the presence of various gases. The detector detects gas in either ppm, %Volume or %LEL concentrations. The standard detector consists of a display board and a power supply board, housed in a heavy-duty enclosure, a sensor specifically designed to detect Oxygen, Toxic or Combustible gases, and optionally, a relay/communication board. A complete monitoring system consists of the detector and a separate read-out device & power supply capable of monitoring a 4-20 mA output and supplying 24 VDC power. There are versions of the detector for hazardous and non-hazardous areas.

SenseAir CMB Features

  • Combustible, Toxic, and Oxygen Versions Available
  • U.S./Canada/IECEx/ATEX Hazardous Area Approved
  • Rugged, Industrial, Cost Effective Design Meets a Wide Range of Application and Project Requirements
  • Robust, Fast Responding Sensors
  • Bright LED Display Model or Lower Cost Blind Model
  • Non-Intrusive Zero & Span Adjustments
  • Easy Installation and Maintenance, Ideal for Retrofit or New Applications
  • 3-wire Design with 4-20mA Output, Options for Modbus or BACnet—Both include 3 Additional Relays
  • Horizontal or Vertical Installation
  • Remote Combustible Sensor Option
  • Field Replaceable Sensor
For more information, contact Ives Equipment. Call Ives at (877) 768-1600 or visit their web site at https://ivesequipment.com.

Ives Equipment Celebrates Those Who Serve and Protect Our Country

Veterans Day

Veterans Day is a day of observance and celebration for those who have served in the United States military. Veterans Day was originally called Armistice Day because of the November 11 Armistice that ended World War I. In 1954 it was officially changed to Veterans Day to include Veterans of all wars. This holiday honors those who took an oath to defend the United States and our Constitution, from all enemies, foreign and domestic. Through the observance of Veterans Day, we remind ourselves of our Veterans patriotism, love of country and willingness to serve and sacrifice for the common good.

Ives Equipment thanks our Veterans, past and present, for serving our country and protecting our freedom.

White Paper: Predicting Cavitation Damage in Control Valves

Cavitation can occur in control valves handling fluids, causing loud noise as well as damaging valve components and ultimately leading to additional costs in process plants. A standardized procedure to evaluate the destructiveness of cavitation-induced still does not exist whereas noise emission can reliably be predicted with the international EN 60534-8-4 standard. This white paper, courtesy of Samson Controls, describes a method to solve this problem by evaluating structure-borne noise in the ultrasonic range.

DOWNLOAD THE WHITE PAPER HERE


For more information on the application of control valves, contact Ives Equipment. Call (877) 768-1600 or visit https://ivesequipment.com.

The Samson 82.7 Rotary Plug Control Valve

Samson 82.7 Rotary Plug Control Valve
The Samson 82.7 double eccentric rotary plug control valve is designed for standard and critical service applications, including process events such as erosion, abrasion, corrosion, cavitation, and flashing. The double eccentric rotary plug design increases flow capacities with only minor reduction in the pressure recovery factor making the design an ideal replacement for linear globe control designs even with cavitation and flashing process conditions present.

The 82.7 control valve has several standard options such as temperature extensions, heating jacket, special packing designs, noise attenuation and cavitation prevention trim sets, etc. The Vetec 82.7 can be assembled with a pneumatic, electric, hydraulic, or electro-hydraulic actuator also offered by the SAMSON group to complete the control valve construction. These control valves are designed according to the modular assembly principle, can be equipped with SAMSON GROUP actuators and valve accessories such as positioners, limit switches, and solenoid valves.



For more information contact Ives Equipment. Call their main office at (877) 768-1600 of visit their web site at https://ivesequipment.com.