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Valves 101: Two Types of Ball Valves

Small-size valve balls are a type of piping equipment that shuts off or controls the flow in a pipeline by using a hollow sphere and round seats held in a valve body. There are two basic technologies for the design of ball valves, floating ball design and trunnion mounted ball design.

The major components of a ball valve include:

Valve body – A pressure vessel that contains the components needed to control or shut off the flow through a pipe. It is designed to connect two or more sections of pipe or tubing to each other.

Ball – A sphere with a flow path (hole or tunnel) through the center of it and a connection point for a shaft to rotate it.

Seats – Round donut-shaped discs that form a seal between the body and ball.

Stem – A shaft that connects the internal ball to the outside of the valve to facilitate rotation of the ball.

Packing – Flexible seals that fit around the shaft and prevent the media traveling through the valve from escaping externally.

Bonnet – The part of the valve body that houses the stem and packing.

Operator or Actuator – An external device designed to rotate the stem of the valve. This can be a lever, a gear, a motor-operated gear (electric actuator), or a pneumatic/hydraulic actuator.

Floating Ball Design

A floating design ball valve sandwiches the hollow ball between two or more cupped seats that form a tight seal between the body and the ball at the inlet and outlet ports of the valve body.