If you’ve heard of ultrasonic cleaning you’ve probably heard of the aluminum foil test. The practice of putting a piece of aluminum foil into an ultrasonically activated tank of water probably began as a novelty demonstration. The holes produced in the aluminum foil by the collapse of cavitation bubbles at least showed that something interesting …
Ultrasonic cavitation and implosion provide a unique benefit in cleaning unmatched by other means. So much so that ultrasonic cleaning is often used as a benchmark to judge the effectiveness of other cleaning techniques. The major factors in cleaning are Time, Temperature, Chemistry and Mechanical Effect or Motion (TTCM). There are other acronyms for these …
Automatic chemical addition and makeup is an attractive on feature on today’s sophisticated cleaning machines. Who wouldn’t appreciate eliminating the drudgery of taking samples, titrating, refractometer readings, or whatever and adding chemistry to a cleaning or rinsing bath manually? The trouble is that automatic chemical makeup is just not possible or applicable in all cases. Although there are …
In a recent blog, I touched on the fact that there is a limit to how long a cleaning solution will continue to produce clean parts as it becomes increasingly contaminated from use. Chemistry and disposing of spent chemistry are both expensive. Changing a bath usually results in a gap in production as the tank(s) …
When particles are the enemy, my general rule is filter, filter, filter! The cost of filtration is small compared to the overall benefit even if it is only “insurance.” There is, of course, the initial cost of installation (filter housings, pumps, plumbing, etc.) but the cost after that is going to be pretty much fixed provided …
What happens when parts exit the cleaning process dirty? First of all, PANIC, especially in the case of critical cleaning for optics, semiconductor, disc drive and other industries where particles that can’t even be seen with a microscope render product worthless and unrecoverable! Then there is the inevitable quest for, “Why this is happening?” Although this scenario is …
The applications for wire seem limitless. Wire is used for electrical conductors as well as in structural applications including suspension bridges and other architectural creations. There are about 1 ½ miles of wire in a typical car today and often over 150 miles in a jetliner. A cruise ship? Somewhere around 3,000 miles! Wire diameters …
I admit, I stole that title from my grandma Bertha. But even in this day, the concept is applicable. Cleaning one thing is one thing, cleaning thousands of things is another. Let’s think about that. Cleaning, as we have discussed before, really amounts to moving contaminants from the surfaces being cleaned and sequestering them in another …
The cleaning process is the “recipe” for cleaning. Like any culinary recipe, it should clearly define the ingredients, times, temperatures and the method of application to be used for cleaning. Most cleaning consists of at least the three basic steps of washing, rinsing and drying. Wash – The purpose of washing is to remove contaminants …
Immersion or spray methods are used in most industrial cleaning processes. Both are effective but one may be better suited than the other in some applications and often for reasons that aren’t immediately obvious. Let’s take a minute to explore some of the benefits and limitations of each. Spray – The most often recognized …
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