Don’t Forget Drying

In my experience, drying deserves a lot more attention than is usually gets in the design of a cleaning system.  If for no other reason, drying deserves extra attention because it is almost always the most time-consuming of all steps in the parts cleaning process.

Emptying the Garbage

The cleaning process is really just an exercise of removing contamination from the surface being cleaned and moving it to a segregated location for collection and disposal. This is accomplished in a number of ways depending on the volume and nature of the contamination. Solid contamination that is more dense than the cleaning media (usually …

Wash, Rinse and Dry

Today’s industrial parts cleaning processes commonly employ at least three distinct steps. The basic steps are Washing, Rinsing, and Drying. Each step is custom tailored to the overall requirement with the range of options for each much broader than one not intimately involved with the technology might imagine. In some processes, in fact, it is …

Get a Move On

There’s an old adage – “One Hand Washes the Other.”  Although this adage is seldom applied to cleaning technology, it certainly could be.  In fact, most successful cleaning consists of a combination of chemistry (soap, solvent or whatever) and some kind of added mechanical force to enhance or enable the cleaning process.  If one could …

The Lowdown on Dirt

One of the first steps in the development of any cleaning process is to define and understand the contaminant or “dirt” that needs to be removed. Sounds simple, right? Not so fast! Dirt comes in all varieties and styles. Different kinds of dirt require different cleaning processes. Some dirt is liquid. Oils, coolants, paint, adhesives, …

The Cost of (Not) Cleaning

Why do we clean things?  “Cleanliness is next to Godliness” immediately comes to mind but doesn’t seem quite appropriate here.  There are tons of reasons to clean things but in the final analysis it comes down to aesthetics and function.  Cleaning makes things look better or function correctly or more efficiently. The typical automobile can …

How Clean is “Clean?”

This over-worn catchphrase has been the title or has at least appeared in countless articles on the subject of cleaning.  Is it in need of a well-earned retirement?  Probably, but in its defense, let me say that “clean” is a pretty nebulous thing. A few minutes ago, I pulled up one of the leading dictionary …