PRODUCING SLURRY FROM DETERGENT LUMPS

Background / Requirement

A large amount of scrap is produced in the detergent manufacturing process. The cost of the detergent scrap along with disposal difficulties make reclaim mandatory and attractive.
The detergent starts out as a wet slurry, then is dried in a spray dryer. Hot exhaust gases from the spray dryer are then cleaned by a cyclone followed by a scrubber. Throughout this process, there are many areas where scrap is produced. The warm, moist nature of the product causes it to cake on the process machinery surfaces. The big problem areas are the slurry tanks, holding bins, cyclone and spray dryer walls as well as conveyor belts. This scrap is produced in a variety of consistencies from rock hard to case hardened mud core lumps.
The scrap must be size reduced to a sufficient size where it will quickly dissolve back into the original slurry for reprocessing. The mud-like, hot, sticky nature of much of the scrap makes size reduction difficult.

Comil Performance The Comil accepts up to 6 inch (150 mm) lumps of various types of detergent scrap. The introduction of water into the Comil, along with the detergent produces a slurry containing particles no larger than 1/16 of an inch (1.6 mm). The slurry flowed freely and was ideally suited for reintroduction into the original batch. Dissolution time is almost nil. Summary The ability of the Comil to handle wet, sticky or otherwise hard to handle products makes it ideally suited to this difficult application. With the simultaneous addition of 30% water by weight along with the detergent scrap, the Comil can produce a product quite similar to the original slurry. This is an excellent, trouble-free Comil application.