In the world of industrial cleaning technology we talk about surface tension a lot! So much so, in fact, that it is hard to enter into any discussion of cleaning without having the subject of surface tension arise. In cleaning chemistry, for example, we are always looking for lower surface tension to promote penetration of small surface features …
A few days ago, I sat down to write what I thought would be a simple explanation of surface tension and how it is measured in the laboratory (a blog which will be published shortly if I can figure all of this out). In doing the normal background research, however, I started to see contradictions …
Viscosity and surface tension are properties that are often intuitively linked to one another. Because these properties are of primary importance in cleaning it will be worth the while to understand them a bit better. Surface tension is the property of a liquid that exists at the interface of the liquid with another media (usually …
Adding water to cleaning and rinsing tanks is inevitable in a cleaning process. Most modern machines include a means to sense liquid level and add more water or other appropriate liquid as necessary. It would seem simple enough, but there are a lot of factors to consider in managing liquid makeup. The first thing to determine is …
My previous blog addressed the chemical cost of using too much (or perhaps too little) “soap” in a cleaning process based on chemical cost. Today we look at process issues. You might be saying, “What the heck? So I use too much chemical. Soap is cheap and I look at it as “insurance”.” Well, that “insurance” …
I have talked before on the blog about the subject of chemical concentration and its relationship to cleaning. A couple of recent incidents prompt me to re-address the subject of chemical concentration but from a little different angle. It’s a “no-brainer” that cleaning chemicals are expensive and, with the possible exception of heat and labor, …
In some cases, previously described oil removal technologies based on the gravity separation of oil from the cleaning solution are unjustifiably cumbersome and expensive. Fortunately, smaller scale solutions are available for use in such applications. Oil Skimmers – Oil skimmers utilize a material which preferentially attracts oil (hydrophobic) to skim floating oil from a surface …
Preceding blogs have described oil removal techniques for industrial cleaning in some detail. It would be nice if this was always a simple consideration – but it is not! The case for using an oil coalescer is pretty clear cut as long as the cleaning chemistry is truly a “splitter” AND, THE OIL IS NOT WATER SOLUBLE. …
In the blogs Chemistry – Oil Splitting and Oil Emulsification – Part 1 and Chemistry – Oil Splitting and Oil Emulsification – Part 2, I discussed how oils are removed from parts using chemistry that either splits or emulsifies the oil. The next step is to collect and get rid of or recycle that removed oil. This …
“Splitting” of oil from a surface as described in a preceding blog is a part of nearly any oil removal process. Note – Even cleaning chemistry that is generally classified as an “emulsifier” has ingredients to promote the initial “splitting” of the oil from the surface being cleaned. These ingredients are often called “surface active …
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