That’s a hell of a pump (chiller)!
3 Likes
Let me just mention that that capacity of heat removal is enough to condense over 90kg of n-Butane per second.
That’s 11,000lbs butane/min.
If y’all can spec a compressor that can keep up, please let me know!
7 Likes
Presumably there is a whole lot of heat that thing needs to dump, math says more than the 35,000kW of cooling it provides.
At that scale it would be brain dead not to use the “waste” heat for the hot side.
So how do I implement that at 10kW?
“mini-split”?!?
2 Likes
In many cases, when heat isn’t required for processes and its “just” a chilling plant, they’d likely be near a body of running water and the water would be used as a heat sink.
If I had to take a design stab at it…purely heuristics at this point…I’d say isolate the heat sink as a heat exchanger with appropriate surface area and flow rate, to have a meaningful dT between inlet and outlet.
I think from a theoretical perspective, the difficulty is having enough heat exchangers surface area.
3 Likes
After peak vapor flow and the ratio of solvent to extract decreases in a batch process it gets harder and harder to separate the solvent from the extract. It becomes an insulator. Here a compressor can speed up the process by lowering the boiling point and positively displacing the remaining vapor.
Ultimately this discussion is a matter of energy. Any energy you design into a system for dt if you add more energy for dp and optimize efficiency it will be faster than the dt alone. Im not arguing that a compressor can be a limiting factor to peak flow Im arguing that a compressor can make a process faster overall.
2 Likes
I don’t know what system you’ve been using, but if I don’t slow mine down I will over recover, at 25c.
That’s just a vessel with 20L of volume pulling vacuum on a 50L vessel… No pumps.
Edit: And that 20L vessel is also only one of my heat exchangers, at the end of the run pulling that vacuum.
5 Likes
Yes. This is the whole kernel of truth about it.
The discussion here is a matter of determining whether pressure or temperature has a greater influence on vapor evolving from a matrix, you’ve made the contention that pressure difference (suction and discharge of the pump) can make the process faster overall.
I agree.
However, you’ve also said you’re not talking about the pump being the limiting factor—only the fact that it can speed up a process. I think the original discussion is about limiting factors in general. No piston-displacement pump can match the natural phase behavior of gasses IF the temperature control is powerful enough. At some point, because there aren’t pumps big enough, you start to wonder if utilizing the extra energy on a pump is even worth it.
4 Likes
When i ran my design passive it never over recovered and eventually all crude reached 35c for easy pour. But run the pumps too far and getting 15-20kg crude stuck to the bottom of the reactor was no fun. Running active allowed us to run more batches in a day and faster.
What happens if your injection to the collection goes through an ffe? Nothing slowing that vapor train down!
4 Likes
Dude. If you could throw a recirculation line on the FFE inlet from the bottom of the ffe…you could control the consistency of what comes out with just pressure and temp.
6 Likes
Let’s talk about that. How would one do that?
Just N2 push it over into another ffe?
1 Like
Butane liquid transfer pump - #47 by cyclopath
I’ve also got a couple of food-boxers if I decide to play the same game on the cold side.
2 Likes
Make it real and youll find the limits of your design. It was fun chasing mine.
1 Like
I’m working with Cema directly right now
Here’s a similar design, but mine is going to have double collection vessels feeding a single recovery path
Into a 300L solvent tank like this
Got big things in the works
5 Likes
How does everyone feel about pumping their extract through a pump?
1 Like
Good point. I haven’t actually torn a haskel down yet. No idea what’s going on in there.
The food boxers might be more appropriate…they are explicitly for food service.
1 Like
Mind explaining that further?
https://www.debem.com.ua/eng/nasos/piwevye_nasosy/
Looking closer, I believe that I’ve got two versions of this critter. PP and 316.
So not their sanitary version, but ptfe diaphragms and compatible seals. No lube.
2 Likes
Thank you 
A pumps worth is of course subjective but can inarguably compress the bell curve of a batch process. Years ago time was way more valuable than processors experience today. It was all about thruput then and i assure you they more than paid for themselves:wink:
2 Likes