How to minimize feed segregation to an agglomerator — Part I
The last 50 years have seen rapid expansion in agglomeration applications for chemicals, pharmaceuticals, biotech products, ceramics, foods, minerals, and other products. As a result of this expansion and stricter requirements for process efficiency and product quality, agglomeration processing steps are under ever-growing scrutiny. This two-part article, which concludes next month, explains how to control one of the most important steps in an agglomeration process -- feeding -- to minimize particle segregation and increase processing reliability and final agglomerate uniformity. The information here focuses on tumbling and pressure agglomeration methods.
To ensure that your agglomerator performs reliably and yields consistent product, you must control the feed to it. This requires controlling not only the feed delivery rate, but the feed uniformity, as well. One of the most common sources of feed nonuniformity is particle segregation, which can lead to unacceptable variations in the feed's particle size, chemical composition, and other properties. Such variations are a common source of processing and product quality problems.