Posts Tagged ‘ultrasonic cleaner’
Ultrasonic Cleaners Selection and Operating Tips
How you select an ultrasonic cleaner involves several points to consider and resolve before putting your money down. Today’s ultrasonic cleaners range from small benchtop or tabletop units with simple on-off switches to highly sophisticated cleaners with adjustable or controllable operating parameters that allow them to perform multiple cleaning tasks. Cleaning solution capacities can range from under one gallon for household or hobbyist applications to hundreds of gallons capable of cleaning automotive, marine and aircraft engines.
Cleaning solution chemistries as well are available in many, many formulations and should be carefully selected (and maintained) to provide optimum cleaning performance based on what is being cleaned and the nature of contaminants being removed. Most of today’s popular ultrasonic cleaning solution formulations are available as water-based concentrates and are biodegradable. These two features provide economies, simplify storage and reduce, if not eliminate, disposal concerns. The problems and challenges associated with trichloroethylene and … Read the rest
How to Prepare Samples Rapidly and Safely
Sample preparation to transform analytes into measurable form can involve complex processes. It is important that the transformation or extraction process avoids chemical degradation that can be caused by excessive heat or mechanically induced damage.
Ultrasonic energy is a proven technique to achieve fast, safe sample preparation. As an example it is a method often specified in USP monographs to extract active pharmaceutical ingredients from carriers for content uniformity and potency assay tests. The ultrasonic process is also ideal for dissolving, dispersing, emulsifying, homogenizing and mixing.
Sample Preparation Steps
Samples to be analyzed are placed in flasks along with a recommended solvent. Flasks are partially immersed in a sonicator bath containing a surfactant. The 37 kHz Elmasonic S Select 150 ultrasonic bath available from Tovatech is especially designed to quickly and safely accomplish sample preparation. The inside dimensions of the shallow basket, (LxWxH) 17.9 x 9.8 x 2.2 … Read the rest
How to Quickly Clean MX and ATV Bike Engine Parts
Messy, time consuming manual cleaning MX and ATV quad bike engine, drive and suspension parts is unnecessary when an ultrasonic cleaner replaces scrubbing with solvents in wash tanks. Cycle service shops as well as MX and ATV clubs can put the power of ultrasound to work to speed throughput and preserve investments in off-road sports equipment.
Ultrasonically cleaning MX and ATV bike parts is faster than manual methods for two reasons:
- Many components do not have to be completely disassembled, but simply immersed in a biodegradable ultrasonic cleaning solution.
- It is thorough because sonic cleaning action removes road dirt, grease, grime, varnish, carbon deposits and other contaminants. Cleaning reaches the tiniest and most inaccessible grooves and blind holes in engine and suspension components – in short all surfaces immersed in the cleaning solution.
Mighty Bubbles Blast Away the Grime
The thoroughness … Read the rest
Reclaim Industrial Filters in an Ultrasonic Cleaner
Google industrial filters and you’ll get about 12.5 million results. Narrow it down to industrial metal mesh filters and the count is just over 1 million. The point: industrial filters are a big business to trap and hold airborne particles such as dust and grease. Other filters are used to strain impurities from water and chemicals. As with your air conditioner filters and your automobile fuel and oil filters particles build up, flow becomes restricted, and eventually filters must be changed.
Frequent filter replacement represents an expense that can be reduced by reclaiming industrial filters in a sonic cleaner. Reclaiming becomes increasingly attractive as replacement cycles shorten or when filters are expensive. Another benefit of reclaiming is that fewer filters wind up in a landfill.
Why Ultrasonic Filter Cleaning Works Best
High-pressure jets of hot water may be used to … Read the rest
When to Use an Industrial Steam Jet Cleaner
A compact steam jet cleaner can be an excellent solution for chemical-free and environmentally friendly removal of deposits such as oil, lubricants, polishing pastes, waxes, chips and filings from cast, machined and other fabricated parts. High temperatures and pressures produced by an industrial steam cleaner remove contaminants from tight spaces such as threaded blind holes, and precision machined and cut gears faster and more thoroughly than hand cleaning, leaving surfaces residue free. Another benefit of steam cleaning is reduced disposal costs for removed contaminants.
Where higher levels of cleanliness are required a steam jet cleaner can be used to prepare parts for an ultrasonic cleaning cycle. Pre-cleaning parts with steam has the added benefit of reducing contaminant build-up in ultrasonic cleaning solutions.
At the end of the cleaning job the cleaner can be used for rinsing. The advantage is that steam is free of minerals and chemical agents; thus … Read the rest
Ultrasonic Cleaning Systems for Precision Optics
Specifying ultrasonic cleaning systems for precision optics requires close collaboration between optics manufacturers establishing optical cleaning requirements and engineers at firms supplying the equipment and chemicals to fulfill those requirements. It is not the intent of this post to specify cleaning equipment and procedures. Instead it’s our objective to provide an overview of Elmasonic equipment for cleaning ophthalmic optics.
And a wide range of equipment it is – ranging from individual cleaning tanks to fully automated multi-stage wash-rinse-dry cleaning lines in a clean room. We’ll briefly describe cleaning chemicals formulated for specific functions from mold manufacturing to cleaning for inspection and cleaning for coating.
Other equipment supporting cleaning optics includes water treatment plants, filtration systems, solvent treatment plants and laminar air flow modules to support clean rooms.
Our role, other than to provide these introductions to equipment and chemicals, is to put you in touch with equipment specialists for cleaning … Read the rest
How to Clean Lab Glassware
Cleaning volumetric lab glassware such as burets, pipettes, flasks, and graduated cylinders can be a daunting task for two reasons: laboratory glassware is susceptible to breakage and associated replacement costs, and complex configurations make thorough cleaning difficult. But all lab personnel know this.
The task is made easier with an ultrasonic cleaner – equipment widely used in labs for a variety of reasons. One of these is being an excellent means to thoroughly remove tenacious contaminants from delicate laboratory glass. The secret to effective sonic cleaning lab glassware is selecting the right cleaner, cleaning solution formulation and establishing a consistent cleaning procedure.
Cleaning is accomplished by cavitation action, the implosion of millions of minute air bubbles created by generator powered transducers bonded to the bottom of the cleaning tank and vibrating at ultrasonic frequencies such as 37,000 cycles per second (37 kHz). The imploding bubbles safely and effectively remove contaminants … Read the rest
Sonic Cleaning Solves 3D Printing Mold Support Challenge
3D printing, also called fused deposition modeling and fused filament fabrication, has revolutionized and lowered the cost of traditional molding techniques such as the lost wax process. By using two moldable thermoplastic formulations such as ABS for the part itself and PLA for removable mold supports 3-D printing is capable of quickly producing highly complex configurations.
A key to the efficiency of the process is fast, safe removal of the PLA mold support without risking damage to the ABS part. An ultrasonic cleaner is proven far faster, safer and more effective than water sprays or manual scrubbing.
3-D Printing in Brief
Computer aided design files for components are programmed into the 3D printer which uses thermoplastic filaments to create components by successively building up extremely thin layers of plastic. The ABS filament ends up as the product; the PLA filament, deposited at the same time, serves as a support for … Read the rest
Powerful Lab Sonicator Speeds Sample Prep in Pharma Research
Ultrasonic cavitation is often employed for sample preparation in pharmaceutical labs. High ultrasonic power density is ideal for these applications because it accomplishes the job quickly. This minimizes cavitation induced heat buildup that can cause chemical degradation of samples.
Sample prep is generally accomplished by suspending sample flasks in ultrasonic cleaners containing water and a surfactant. Cavitation generated by ultrasonic transducers passes through the flask walls to act on the sample.
Most equipment used in this application handles several flasks at once for production-scale operations. An alternative design has proved especially efficient by speeding up the sample prep process in pharmaceutical research laboratories. The secret is in the design.
Elma’s S50R Lab Sonicator for Sample Prep
The 0.75 gallon to 1.5 gallon capacity 37 kHz multifunction Elma S50R laboratory sonicator available from Tovatech … Read the rest
An Ultrasonic Cleaner Design for Food Laboratories
Food laboratory technicians charged with cleaning sieves used to inspect raw materials for correct grain size may welcome a specially designed ultrasonic cleaner developed by acoustic R&D engineers at Elma Ultrasonic in collaboration with food lab personnel at two locations.
The result of this collaboration is the Elma S50R ultrasonic cleaner available from Tovatech. It is optimized for sieve cleaning, but also for degassing HPLC solvents and for sample preparation involving difficult-to-dissolve substances. A unique feature of the S50R is its built-in programming: food scientists can select three programs by pressing the corresponding key on the cleaner’s control panel: sieve cleaning, degassing and sample prep. There is also an on-off key for standard cleaning and a timer showing set and remaining time.
Sieve Cleaning Challenges Solved
While ultrasonic cleaning is safer and gentler than using brushes to dislodge particles trapped in lab sieves thoroughness has been a problem due to … Read the rest
