Wednesday, January 4, 2012

The Use Of Inline Mixers In The Chemical Industry

By Adriana Noton


Inline mixers or in-line mixers are used in the chemical industry for a variety of different functions. Many different businesses from many different industries use inline mixers to make complex chemical creations that end up being brand name products on store shelves.

Generally, mixing equipment is used to combine liquids with solids, liquids with liquids or solids with solids to change the structure of the materials and make the desired product. In-line mixers are actually a part of the process line and are set up before or after a homogenizer or disperser. This characteristic helps to simplify and speed up the entire chemical mixing process to make the production line more efficient. Inline mixers also help improve the viscosity of different products, as well as the particle distribution within a suspension.

Some of the uses of in-line mixers in the chemical industry include different pigments, automotive coatings, resins, calcium carbonate, paper coatings, ink, paint, carbon black, Cab-o-sil, polyvinyl alcohols and bentonite clay.

With automotive coatings, it's easy to see the influence of in-line mixers as you drive the streets or walk through a dealership. Cars are available in a multitude of different shades and colours, and before the final coating finds its way onto the surface of the car, it likely went through an inline mixer as part of the process to mix the chemicals sufficiently. Calcium carbonate is best known in the form of blackboard chalk, but it also created for chemical purposes with the help of inline mixers. Calcium carbonate can be created by combining carbon dioxide and calcium hydroxide. This mixture is known as precipitated calcium carbonate and the particles are very fine and controlled. Variations of calcium carbonate can also be made from marble or limestone and used for different applications.

In-line mixers also process diatomaceous earth or DE, which is a talc type of powder with an off-white colour. DE is actually the fossilized remains of marine phytoplankton and is processed by inline mixers for use in the food industry. DE is added to many grain-based foods to help keep bugs away. Polyvinyl alcohol is a cream coloured or white powder that is created in in-line mixers and added as a moisture barrier for supplement tablets or other foods that must be protected from excess moisture.

Carbon black is a product that in-line mixers help to make and is used in a variety of different applications. It looks like a black, fine powder and about 90 percent of it is used in making rubber products like tires. Carbon black is also used in different pigments, plastic products, printing inks and coatings. The use of inline mixers in the chemical industry will help to make more efficient production lines, higher quality products and financial savings over older methods. Mixing chemicals is an exact, sometimes dangerous science, and having your process set up with in-line mixers to do the job will only benefit the business in the end.




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