When Hydro Polymers decided to install equipment to allow it to determine that products meet BS 6425 and CEI ICE 754-2, it appointed Elite Thermal Systems to design the system
A Hydro Polymers spokesman commented: "We looked at various suppliers and it was obvious that Elite would be able to supply us with what we were looking for".
The Elite solution has a heated zone of 610mm and comprises a specially designed 1200C single zone tube furnace, quartz combustion tube, three wash bottles, combustion boats, sample carrier, load monitoring thermocouple and temperature indicator, all necessary connecting glass tubing and leak-tight rubber stoppers.
In addition, Elite designed the system with a number of innovative features that make it ideal for this work.
These include graded low thermal mass insulation, which provides rapid response times and optimum thermal efficiency, and an outer mesh case cover to promote natural air-cooling that ensures operator safety and comfort.
The process starts with a weight sample being loaded into a combustion boat, which is inserted into the combustion tube and then into the hot zone of the furnace via a non-contact sample carrier system to maintain the integrity of the sample environment.
Dry, filtered air is then introduced, the temperature in the furnace raised to 800C and held for 30 minutes.
Enveloped gases from burnt material are trapped by bubbling through the distilled water in the wash bottles and the acidity measured by determining the pH value.
Elite produce a range a standard ovens and furnaces up to 2000C, which are suitable for many applications.
Where specific thermal process characteristics are required, Elite will design a custom solution to meet the needs of the system
