Compressor Pulsation Dampener Bottle Calculator (API 618)
Size API 618 suction and discharge pulsation surge bottles, internal choke tubes, and calculate acoustic Helmholtz resonance frequencies.
Compressor Swept Volume & Speed
Recommended Bottle Sizing & Acoustics
Recommended Tools & Equipment
Tested hardware and components for high reliability
API 618 Acoustic Pulsation Bottle Principles
Reciprocating compressor cylinders intake and discharge gas in discontinuous, intermittent bursts. These cyclic pressure pulses excite acoustic standing waves within attached piping loops. Without properly tuned dampener bottles, acoustic resonance causes severe shaking forces that rupture branch connections, crack pipe flanges, and destroy compressor valves.
Two-Chamber Baffled Choke Tube Acoustics
High-performance API 618 dampeners divide the surge vessel into two internal compartments connected by an internal concentric choke tube. This configuration creates an acoustic low-pass Helmholtz filter. Pulsation frequencies above the cutoff frequency are reflected backward, reducing peak-to-peak dynamic pressure pulses in external plant headers to below $1.0\%$.