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Kessler's Inc., a
busy meat processing plant, distributing to 14 Eastern states, had a major water problem.
Water is used in the manufacture of meat products, including hot dogs and smoked
meats, and is of great importance to the end product as well as the
general operation of the plant. The calcium
scale in the water coming to their plant was so bad that 1.5-inch water pipe was 80% blocked. It was clogged to the point that there was only ½ inch diameter of flow area. The open pipe flow was 60 gpm. The clogged pipe flow was 20 gpm.
They had tried cleaning the pipe mechanically and chemically. Neither approach
ever lasted very long.
After unsatisfactory results with these other methods, Kessler's replaced
the entire pipe with a copper pipe and installed a Triangular Wave Deposit
Control System. The unit has been installed for about one year. Result:
Kessler's has not had to clean the pipe since the TWT installation. Not only is the scale reduced in the pipes, but
they are also finding scale in the return tank of the cooling tower. That is old scale that has detached from the cooling
tower, demonstrating the downstream, plant-wide effects of the TWT
treatment. In addition, they have noticed that the boiler is staying clean.
Their chemical supplier said they no longer need chemicals, much as he hated to admit it.
They disconnected three water softeners attached to the main water line after they installed the Triangular Wave
Deposit Control System, as the softeners no longer served a purpose.
The plant engineer estimated they had used a 100-pound bag of salt every 1 ½ weeks for the water softener and spent $2,000 per year for chemicals. Spray nozzles in the ovens
are used to spray meat after it is cooked, to cool it and prevent over-cooking.
Previously, Kessler's would have to auger out those nozzle holes weekly to keep them operating properly.
With the TWT treatment, they no longer need to clear out the nozzles.
The vacuum chamber machine has two "heads" that cool the film used to package the meat products. The heads are aluminum, and the water, with all of the chemicals, was pitting the small water passages in the heads. They used separate water softeners to fight the problem. Now they no longer have a corrosion problem, and they do not need the softeners.
The electricity usage savings was a dramatic 9%, due to clean equipment, clean heat transfer surfaces, and clean pipe surfaces meaning less horsepower is needed to pump the water. |
