Using mechatronics technology to assess pressure filtration

Abstract

This paper describes some recent (initial) developments in laboratory scale cake filtration technology which may ultimately lead to the production of standard equipment for assessing filtration performance. The principles of mechatronics, which integrates electronics, computers, process control and mechanical systems, have been used to provide a state-of-the-art pressure filtration apparatus capable of performing repeatable experiments over a range of pressure/flow regimes commonly encountered in industrial filtrations. Data obtained at constant pressure and proportionally controlled variable pressure are presented to illustrate the scope of the apparatus and the benefits of removing operator interference and damaging pumping operations from filtration experiments. It is shown how scale-up parameters (obtained for aqueous mineral suspensions) can be used to successfully predict constant pressure filtration performance and the problems which can arise when predictions of more compressible variable pressure filtrations are made using data obtained at constant pressure.

Cake filter scale-up, simulation and data acquisition—A new approach

“…In the case of the author, manual operation has been replaced by a mechatronics philosophy that combines electronics, computer technology and automatic control to facilitate experiments over any chosen pressure/flow regime without altering inherent suspension properties [Tarleton and Hancock, 1997;Tarleton, 1998;Tarleton, 1999a;Tarleton and Wakeman, 2006]. Raised levels of sophistication introduce new research opportunities, allow more consistent and accurate data to be obtained and provide an impetus for further developments.…”

Multi-phase ceramics by computer-controlled pressure filtration

“…Advances have been made in extending the capabilities of filter presses to get more accurate and on-line information about cake formation and filtration behaviour of suspensions. 14 Approaches taken to study cake formation in slip cast ceramics using ultrasonics 15,16 should be applicable to pressure slip casting as well.…”

Using statistical and artificial neural networks to predict the permeability of loosely packed granular materials

“…For the modelling and regression based techniques the data (total of 547 points) was obtained from previous studies [5,15,[51][52][53][54][55][56]. The results are compared with the predicted values from the particle size analysis data using analytical models (K-C and H-B).…”