There is an old and simple way of removing free and emulsified water from oil with the help of material like Fuller Earth, but i dont know if it is technically correct.Some people heat the hydraulic or transformer oil upto 80 degree C in a barrel and put 2Kg of Fuller Earth/Bentonite/Dolomite/ Activated clay/ Geolite into it, and stir up vigorously, then they leave the oil to settle down for 24 hours or more. The mud consisting of the earth or other material which was put into the oil settles down at the bottom of the barrel.The oil free from water is taken out by decantation process. Now this oil is filtered through very fine filters of 1 micron to remove the solid contaminants to get clean oil free from water and contaminants.
They say that this process removes some acidity also from the oil.Heating the oil also does not oxidise the oil due to heavy presence of water into it.The transformer oil thus cleaned was tested by some labs and approved, they were not told how the oil was cleaned, might be they did not apply sophisticated methods.But the method of removing water in this way seems to be simple and economical.
Can anybody tell if this process does not have any technical flaw, are all the materials like Fuller Earth mentioned as above equally capable of giving satisfactory results,or only a few of them are effective?
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