Roughly speaking, evaporators and condensers are both heat exchange equipment and there is no difference. But in terms of usage, there is a difference between an evaporator and a condenser. The condenser is used to emit heat, while the evaporator is used to absorb heat.

From a rough perspective, to understand the difference between an evaporator and a condenser, it is still necessary to first understand what an evaporator is and what a condenser is.

As mentioned earlier, evaporators and condensers are both heat exchange equipment. What is a heat exchange equipment?

Heat exchange equipment refers to the equipment that requires two or more fluids with different temperatures to conduct mutual heat transfer, and the equipment that conducts heat transfer is called heat exchange equipment. Therefore, evaporators and condensers are both heat exchange equipment.

What is an evaporator?

Evaporator is a unit operation that uses heating to heat solutions containing different substances and non volatile solutes to a boiling state, causing some solvents to vaporize and be removed, thereby increasing the concentration of the solution in the solvent.

The evaporator mainly consists of two parts: a heating chamber and an evaporation chamber. The heating chamber provides the heat required for evaporation of the liquid, promoting its boiling and vaporization. The evaporation chamber is a component that completely separates the gas-liquid phases.

What is a condenser?

The condenser is a component of the refrigeration system and also a component of the entire evaporator system. The condenser is mainly used to release heat. It can convert gas or steam into liquid and quickly release heat.

The working process of a condenser is an exothermic process, and the device that converts steam into liquid during the evaporation process is also known as a condenser. All condensers operate by taking away the heat of gas or steam.

The difference between evaporator and condenser

From the above concepts of evaporator and condenser, it can be seen that the difference between the two is that the condenser is mainly used to emit heat, while the evaporator is used to absorb heat.

The difference between evaporators and condensers is mainly due to their different working forms. Evaporators absorb heat from the medium for vaporization and absorb external heat, while condensers are devices that cool and liquefy the medium and release heat from the outside.

The evaporator and condenser also differ in structure.

In evaporator design, selection and design should be based on the evaporation capacity, evaporation materials, etc. of the entire system.

In the design of condensers, there should be a split flow path, with the inlet and outlet of different paths as close as possible, and the inlet and outlet should also be as far away as possible to avoid loss of heat exchange due to reheating and uneven flow distribution.

In practical design, if there are more than two branches, centralized liquid separators and collectors should be used to ensure uniform flow between different flow paths. The tube passes of different flow paths should preferably be the same, and should flow evenly through the windward and leeward sides to ensure uniform heat transfer.

The above is a brief introduction to the differences between evaporators and condensers. The difference between evaporators and condensers lies in the fact that one is a heat releasing device and the other is a heat absorbing device.