Some Typical Steam Traps

They have a float that rises and falls in relation to condensate level in the body of 

This makes the thermostatic trap suitable to remove large quantities of air and cold condensate at the start-up condition, especially for batch-wise processes. 

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VALVES. A typical processing plant contains thousands of valves of many different sizes and shapes. Despite the variety in their design, however, all valves have a common primary purpose to slow down or stop the flow of a fluid. Some valves work best in on-or-off service, fully open or fully closed. Others are designed to throttle, to reduce the pressure and flow rate of a fluid. Still others permit flow in one direction only or only under certain conditions of temperature and pressure. A steam trap, which is a special form of valve, allows water and inert gas to pass through while holding back the steam. Finally, through accessory devices, valves can be made to control the temperature, pressure, liquid level, or other properties of a fluid at points remote from the valve itself. 

When the product gases exit from the TLX, they are still too hot for compression and must be cooled to essentially ambient temperatures. Part of the additional cooling is accomplished in some plants with a direct oil quench the hot oil can be used to generate steam. Typically, in the final stage of cooling, a tower equipped with water sprays and a trap provides intimate contact between the water and the gaseous streams. The resultant water and liquid hydrocarbon phase (of heavier hydrocarbons) from this tower are separated in settling drums. Valuable products in both the water and oil phases are recovered and processed. The... 

For some applications in which samples are in solution, or are wet, it is desirable to remove the volatile solvent components prior to analysis. In the case of organic solvents, it is common to evaporate the solvent by heating either on a steam bath or in a rotary film evaporator. In such situations, the final traces of volatile material are typically removed in a vacuum oven. Caution Make sure that oil traps are used on all vacuum lines pump oil vapors from a vacuum pump will contaminate samples in a vacuum oven. In cases in which a thermally sensitive material must be removed from an aqueous solution, freeze-drying is a practical alternative for isolating the sample if suitable equipment is available. 

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