Using a conical screw mixer for more than mixing
Do you need to mix as well as dry or agglomerate your material? A conical screw mixer can be adapted to handle processing tasks in addition to mixing, which can eliminate the need for additional equipment in some applications. This article introduces you to conical screw mixers, then explains how the mixer can be adapted for handling other tasks while mixing, such as heating and cooling, drying, agglomerating, deagglomerating, causing or preventing chemical or physical reactions, or storing. The last section discusses selecting a conical screw mixer for your application.
Mixing can be done with a batch mixer or a continuous mixer. A batch mixer is a standalone vessel in which all the ingredients are loaded, agitated until homogeneously dispersed or mixed, and then discharged. The mixer is suited to applications requiring high mixing accuracy and validation of batch-to-batch consistency. Because ingredients are typically added manually, the ingredient proportions can be accurately controlled while saving the cost of proportioning equipment. A continuous mixer is a process line vessel that is continuously fed the correct proportions of ingredients; the ingredients are quickly mixed, sometimes with intense agitation, as they travel through the vessel in one pass, and the mixture is discharged to the next equipment in the process. The mixer is suited to mixing large amounts of material when the degree of homogeneity isn't highly critical and to extruding materials when few ingredients are mixed and short dwell times and intense agitation don't impair the process.