EDA Inc.
Engineering and Design Associates, Inc.
1033 Carter Street
Folsom California 95630 USA
(916) 941-5376 e-mail
1033 Carter Street
Folsom California 95630 USA
(916) 941-5376 e-mail
How O'Brien Agglomerators Work
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Agglomerators are used to increase the particle size of powders. They are very useful for powders of different particle sizes and/or densities that would otherwise seperate when handled. They are used when minor ingredients, often expensive ingredients, must be uniform throughtout a powder.
There are two basic types of agglomerators; compaction and noncompaction. The compaction type uses mechanical pressure (and often very high pressures) to "press" the powders together. For these, binders are sometimes not needed to make the particle. Compaction agglomerators are highly specialized, and not addressed here.
Any system that consists of at least one powder of any size, or mixture of sizes, and a liquid binder are agglomeration candidates.
Agglomerators keep the powders mixing while spraying a binding liquid. The binder is sprayed and then dries or sets or cures or otherwise hardens sealing the powders into a single bead. The need to keep the powders well mixed usually works against the idea of agglomeration. Mixers use high shear for mixing. This high shear also breaks particles down rather then agglomerates them. Ed O'Brien came up with the idea of a gentle mixing within his agglomerator in the 1960s.
The O'Brien has a unique internal recycle system built into the interior of the turning drum. The internal spiral transports the powders towards one end of the drum, The bars lift fine materials to preferentially expose them to the binder spray. These internals are engineered with years of experience to achieve gentle, yet through, processing.
The O'Brien design provides process and economic advantages for both large scale, commodity type materials, (such as detergents, fertilizers and other large volume organic and inorganic chemicals) and single batches as small as one cubic foot of material.
O'Brien Agglomerator Details
Below are a couple of drawings of the typical O'Brien Agglomerator in action:
The spray is to the right.
"The Falling Curtain of Dry Material" is the fine powders that the Rod Cage will tend to lift from the churning powder bed.
The idea here is to spray the smaller particles and not just coat larger particles.
This is another view of the O'Brien Agglomeratort internals.
Return to Agglomerators Main Page
Go to Agglomerator Pictures
Go to Benchtop Agglomerator
Agglomerators are used to increase the particle size of powders. They are very useful for powders of different particle sizes and/or densities that would otherwise seperate when handled. They are used when minor ingredients, often expensive ingredients, must be uniform throughtout a powder.
There are two basic types of agglomerators; compaction and noncompaction. The compaction type uses mechanical pressure (and often very high pressures) to "press" the powders together. For these, binders are sometimes not needed to make the particle. Compaction agglomerators are highly specialized, and not addressed here.
Any system that consists of at least one powder of any size, or mixture of sizes, and a liquid binder are agglomeration candidates.
Agglomerators keep the powders mixing while spraying a binding liquid. The binder is sprayed and then dries or sets or cures or otherwise hardens sealing the powders into a single bead. The need to keep the powders well mixed usually works against the idea of agglomeration. Mixers use high shear for mixing. This high shear also breaks particles down rather then agglomerates them. Ed O'Brien came up with the idea of a gentle mixing within his agglomerator in the 1960s.
The O'Brien has a unique internal recycle system built into the interior of the turning drum. The internal spiral transports the powders towards one end of the drum, The bars lift fine materials to preferentially expose them to the binder spray. These internals are engineered with years of experience to achieve gentle, yet through, processing.
The O'Brien design provides process and economic advantages for both large scale, commodity type materials, (such as detergents, fertilizers and other large volume organic and inorganic chemicals) and single batches as small as one cubic foot of material.
O'Brien Agglomerator Details
Below are a couple of drawings of the typical O'Brien Agglomerator in action:
The spray is to the right.
"The Falling Curtain of Dry Material" is the fine powders that the Rod Cage will tend to lift from the churning powder bed.
The idea here is to spray the smaller particles and not just coat larger particles.
This is another view of the O'Brien Agglomeratort internals.
The drawing on the left is a part of the original O'Brien patent. This shows a different perspective that may be helpful in understanding the O'Brian Agglomerator operation.
Label #16 is the shell, #36 is a cross section of the powder bed, number 56 is the spray bar, #58 is one spray nozzle, and #32 is the end plate.
This is a picture of a production scale O'Brien. The bars, spiral and spray nozzles are seen.
The agglomerator operator has unprecedented control over physical properties of the final product This control comes from the flexibility of changing the amount, position and spray nozzle size; the intensity of the spray (spray pressure); rotation speed of the agglomerator drum; incoming powder feed rate, and other chemical and physical conditions.
The fastest and surest way to determine the feasibility of an O'Brien Agglomerator for any particular powder system is to perform test runs in the EDA Benchtop Agglomerator. Click here for the Benchtop Agglomerator page.
Why and when an O'Brien type agglomerator is better.
The O'Brien
- Agglomerator works best in situations where low capital investment, low operating and low maintenance costs are significant.
- The same O'Brien agglomerator is used for batch processing or on a continuous production basis.
- Production flexibility and asset reuse if needed is ensured.
- Scale up from the Benchtop Agglomerator is easy. The internals and liquid/powder contact characteristics are "1:1 dynamically similar" between the Benchtop Agglomerator and larger units. No uncertainty of scale up to a larger production agglomerator.
- Capacities can be reliably and easily determined from agglomerator test runs.
A few pictures of some O'Brien agglomerators are available here.
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Return to Agglomerators Main Page
Go to Agglomerator Pictures
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