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Product category: Manufacturing Machinery and Plant Equipment
News Release from: Elga Process Water | Subject: Cylinder exchange service
Edited by the Engineeringtalk Editorial Team on 04 February 2003

Cylinder exchange programme keeps toner
in shape

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A reliable supply of deionised water is crucial to the production of chemical products by Avecia at its Grangemouth site.

One of the huge range of fine chemical products manufactured by Avecia at its Grangemouth site is a new chemically produced toner for use in copiers and printers This new product material is at the forefront of electrophotography, with a precision controlled particle size and improved powder characteristics that mean high resolution colour and black and white printing with less dust and lower toner scatter

The final stage in the manufacturing process is filtration of the toner and washing with high purity water.

At the moment the material is manufactured at pilot scale, and uses about 160m3 of deionised water each week.

The pilot plant posed an interesting problem.

"Although there is deionised water on site, there was no supply near enough for us to connect into", says Avecia's Jeff James.

With capital expenditure initially restricted and time pressing, the development team opted to use Vivendi Water Systems' cylinder exchange service.

Cylinder exchange was introduced by Vivendi Water Systems back in 1955, and the company has been the UK's leading supplier of the service ever since.

The concept is simple: Vivendi Water Systems provides a cylinder, similar to a compressed air cylinder, containing mixed-bed ion exchange resins.

James connects it to a mains water supply and it produces high purity deionised water.

When the resins are exhausted the cylinder is taken offline and replaced with a spare, meanwhile the exhausted cylinder is returned to Vivendi Water Systems for regeneration in exchange for a new cylinder.

Vivendi Water Systems operates its own transport fleet and delivers directly to the point of use.

This ensures that cylinders are handled correctly and that the client is not inconvenienced.

There is no expensive plant and no regeneration chemicals to handle, just a cylinder to change for the spare one held in Avecia's stores.

"The necessary equipment was delivered from stock and we had deionised water on tap within a matter of days", says James.

"When we move up to full scale manufacture we'll install a permanent deionised water system, but the convenience and flexibility of the cylinder exchange service means that we'll be able to relocate it to another pilot plant".

Vivendi Water Systems is proud to be helping the UK fine chemical industry to stay ahead of the rest of the world.

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