Victaulic XL Fittings vs Additional Rubber on Elbow Extrados
Victaulic has come up with an interesting way to increase the longevity of fittings for mining and wear applications. For those of you who haven’t hear yet, the concept is to produce a larger ID fitting in order to add more rubber in the critical fittings, enabling your fittings to last longer. These fittings will than mate up to your standard sized ID, OD pipe. Using a stepped XL coupling it bolts up to your existing pipe with the same ease of all 07 and 77 couplings. The ID of the thicker lined fittings matches up perfectly to your thinner lined pipe.
The majority of wear occurs in changes in direction. Elbows are particularly vulnerable to wear do to this fact. By increasing the rubber in the fittings from 1/4″ thick rubber to 1/2″ rubber you get two benefits. You get a thicker wear sub-straight and a better cushion for the forces on the liner. The result is a significant increase in lifespan from these fittings.
The down side to these fittings is that you can no longer use the standard 77 or 07 couplings in your system. You will need to get the stepped XL couplings. Since these fittings are unique to rubber lined systems the availability and lead time on these components can be a challenge.
Traditionally the way to increase the life in your elbows is to add an additional layer of 1/4″ rubber on the extrados of the elbow. This created the 1/2″ of rubber desired. This allows users to keep their existing couplings and adds longenvity to the elbows..
The downside to this type of additional wear material is the transitions are not always made the same. Depending on the rubber liner installer, you can get various transitions in the rubber, some better than others. If a bad transition is made in the rubber, you can get an undesired turbulent effect. This will result in eddy currents in the elbows and fittings and this effect will prematurely wear out the liner.
Victaulic has created a good system which addresses the additional material required in high wear situations. It is an effective way to increase the life span of your fittings. The ID’s of the fittings and pipe having no transitions which ensures no unintended premature wear.