Aluminium plate heat-exchangers

The most prominent coating technique for catalysts is wash-coating, which allows both the coating of a catalyst carrier and the coating of a ready-made catalyst onto a substrate. It may be applied for ceramic and metallic monoliths (see Section 6.2) as well as for plates of a stainless steel or aluminium plate heat-exchangers. 

Alpema. The standards of the brazed aluminium plate-fin heat exchanger. Houston Association Alpema, 1994. 

Brazed Aluminium Plate-Fin Heat Exchanger Manufacturers Association (ALPEMA), The ALPEMA Standards, 2nd ed. (2000) available on-line at http //www.alpema.org/stand.htm, accessed 14 June 2007. 

Two dissimilar metals in contact in an aqueous environment does not necessarily give rise to galvanic corrosion. Turner [1990] cites an example of a shell and tube heat exchanger (steam condenser), containing aluminium brass tubes expanded into carbon steel tube plates. It could be anticipated that with the relatively large area of the noble aluminium brass, severe galvanic corrosion would occur on the smaller area of exposed steel resulting in a short service life. In fact the condenser had been in service for 26 years when the examination took place ... 

Plate-fm heat exchangers are manufactured by assembling plates separated by corrugated sheets, which form the fins. The plates are made from aluminium sealed by brazing. The operation of these devices requires clean fluids. The main applications can be found in cryogenic and natural gas liquefaction for pressures and temperatures up to 60 bars and 150 °C. 

The heat exchangers in the cryogenic section of an air separator are almost exclusively of the aluminium plate fin type. 

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