Virgin Oil Purification using Electrostatic Filtration

Q, I believe that will work cleaning up virgin oil to your specs. I trust the plant you plan to purchase this for is not called upon to run very often. These technologies impart an electrical charge to the particles suspended in the fluid to encourage their capture and removal. This can be done through electrostatic precipitation and/or agglomeration. These technologies are designed to only remove particles that are in suspension. They have been proven to be very effective at removing sub-micron contaminants. One application that they appear to have advantages is cleaning up sub-micron carbonaceous by-products that develop in some phosphate ester based EHC systems. Often when turbine oil is @ operating temperature these devices fail to remove the soluable varnish. They work great if youre in an extended outage like a major or a HGP where youre off gear for a week or two. If this is not the case you truly need to shop around and be sure to ask for guarantee that your MPC or QSA value is lowered to within the normal levels and remain there.

JP Chapin
www.fluitec.com

In refernece to the previous postings description of how EOC works to remove particles............
There is a great deal of misunderstanding in industry about how an electrostatic particle
removal system (more commonly known as Electrostatic Oil Conditioner, “EOC” by Kleentek)
actually removes particle and varnish contamination. In fact, many references incorrectly
describe this technology in the context of oil conditioning when they indicate that this
technology charges particles in order to remove them.
Electrostatic Oil Conditioners DO NOT CHARGE THE PARTICLES. Instead, they use
a voltage field to influence particles through electrostatic force, but no flow of electrical
current is imposed on the particles (or the fluid). In fact, the power supply used for
creating the needed voltage field is only capable of producing less than 20 mA (or 0.020
amperes) of current flow.
An EOC system removes two particle types: particles that carry a net charge and particles
that are polar in nature (net zero overall charge, but having a non-uniform charge
distribution within the particle). Whether particles are soft or hard, the EOC is equally
effective at removing them (unlike mechanical media-type filters). Non-polar substances
(such as good oil molecules) are not removed by the EOC.
Needless to say, you should be able to obtain your NAS target with EOC technology.

Balanced Charge Agglomeration also charges particles in the oil. The main difference is BCA uses filtration to remove agglomerated particles, where EOC uses a charge chamber to capture particles. While both work comparably in removing submicron particles, changing filters is easier and cheaper than EOC where the collection chamber is replaced. Since filters are used, there is less back pressure so higher velocities can be achieved in the filtration system. Also, the pressure drop across the charging mixing system is very low. The result is higher flow rates in BCA systems in a given size. The higher flow allows a more rapid cleanup and an ability to remove contamination at a high rate, far exceeding ingress. Lower particle counts and VPI are thus possible in active systems where ingress is a problem.

Thank you all for your kind response..

we are waiting for the machine..

Thanks again..

Many equipment manufacturers' new oil cleanliness specs are absurdly low. I'm not sure if this has to do with the recent obsession with particle count as the be-all and end-all of oil testing, or my more parnoid notion that if you set the new oil limit where no one is going to meet it, you can avoid a lot of warranty claims.
I've read ISO 11500, which tells you how to run a particle count that you can then report under the ISO 4406 classifications. I doubt any lab in the world is actually going through all of that to run in compliance. It's certainly not being done as part of a $20-30 or so UOA that includes a half-dozen other tests.
Apart from the fact that probably no two labs on the planet run particle count the same way, you have the problem that you really can't be sure all of the particles the lab counted came out of your system.
Particle counts are The Devil.

Yes, an electrostatic oil cleaner is excellent for pre-filtering new oil to an NAS Class 6. As a matter of fact we have alot of experience at filtering new oil which is generally a NAS Class 9 or 10 right out of the drum.

If you are able to "kidney loop" filter, where you first pump all the oil out of a drum into a clean tank and then hook the electrostatic oil cleaner up to the tank so it can circulate filter the entire product before then filtering it into the reservoir you will reach your NAS Class 6 much quicker and easier.

I would suggest using an Electrostatic oil cleaner that is both fast and efficient. Check out www.oilkleen.com for more information.


Also, there seems to be some questions on this posting about varnish removal. Check out the link below to see before and after photos of real varnish stripping from internal metal surfaces. This is the true test of any technology claiming to remove varnish. If your vendor can not produce before and after pictures like this then they really are not removing varnish.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_FkV_SWETU

Just for the record we ended up getting an NAS 4 on the virgin oil filtration before filling the reservoir on a recent project. Another similar pre-filtering project yielded an NAS 3 in the US.

Thanks Paul..

We are waiting for the second unit asap, good luck and thanks for your support..

Mohammed..

quote:

Originally posted by OILKLEEN:
.....Check out the link below to see before and after photos of real varnish stripping from internal metal surfaces. This is the true test of any technology claiming to remove varnish. If your vendor can not produce before and after pictures like this then they really are not removing varnish.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_FkV_SWETU

Well, I did check the advertized "pictures", and found them to be misleading if not outright fraudulent representation of the “claim”. The "before" and "after" pictures are shot from significantly different angles, which makes any meaningful comparison of the surfaces impossible.

The customer took the pictures John and at different times...however, your statement about "fraudulent representation" really bothers me. I would never produce pictures that our systems could not deliver the same results for anyone who has this problem.

Anytime you want to conduct a similar trial on a system and publish the results call OILKLEEN and I will show you the amazing results.

OILKLEEN, with all due respect, I based my comments on (what I disappointingly saw as) a poor and failed attempt to present a possible success case in the “picture’s worth a thousand words” format.

John - I appreciate your comments. Just because an electrostatic oil cleaner (or other varnish mitigation technology) works in one situation, it does not mean it will work the same in all situations. There are dozens of different varnish chemistries both in the oil and on machine surfaces. It is too simplistic (and untrue) to say that one technology solves all problems.

The only reason we show these pictures is show people there is a huge difference between stripping "varnish build up" and simply lowing the amount of varnish in the oil (patch test)....I am also trying to show people that the best varnish test on a system is to look at an internal metal part that is below the fluid level to determine if their system has varnish...

Too many contamination control programs are only relying on a color membrane patch test to determine varnish levels and there is so much more that needs to be looked at. Furthermore, I agree with Greg that there is no "one black box" solution to varnish and that is why we use an interchangeable series of filter elements depending on what contaminant we are removing with our system.

Varnish is complicated and needs to be addressed in a systematic approach, but is 100% preventable if done correctly.