The Rotary Drum Precoat Filter

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Description
The Rotary Drum Precoat Filter is used to polish solutions having traces of
contaminating insolubles. To polish the solution the drum deck is precoated with a
medium of a known permeability and particle size that retains the fines and produces
a clear filtrate.
The following materials are used to form the precoat bed:

Diatomaceous Earth (or Diatomite) consisting of silicaceous skeletal remains

of tiny aquatic unicellular plants.
Perlite consisting of glassy crushed and heat-expanded rock from volcanic
origin.
Cellulose consisting of fibrous light weight and ash less paper like medium.
Special ground wood is becoming popular in recent years since it is
combustible and reduces the high cost of disposal. There are nowadays
manufacturers that grind, wash and classify special timber to permeabilities
which can suit a wide range of applications.

These materials when related to precoating are wrongly called filter-aids since they
do not aid filtration but serve as a filter medium in an analogy to the filter cloth on a
conventional drum filter.
The Precoat Filter is similiar in appearance to a conventional Drum Filter but its
construction is very different:

The scraper blade on conventional drum filters is stationary and serves

mainly to deflect the cake while it is back-blown at the point of discharge. The
scraper on a precoat filter, which is also called "Doctor Blade", moves slowly
towards the drum and shaves-off the blinding layer of the contaminants
together with a thin layer of the precoating material. This movement exposes
continuously a fresh layer of the precoat surface so that when the drum
submerges into the tank it is ready to polish the solution. The blade
movement mechanism is equipped with a precision drive having an adjustable
advance rate of 1-10 mm/hr. The selected rate is determined by the

penetration of fines into the precoat bed

which, in turn, depends on the permeability of
the filter aid. Once the entire precoat is
consumed the blade retracts at a fast rate so
that the filter is ready for a new precoating
cycle.

The cake discharges on conventional drum

filters by blow-back hence a section of the
main valve's bridge setting is allocated for this
purpose. On precoat filters the entire drum
deck is subjected to vacuum therefore there
are two design options:

A conventional valve that is piped,

including its blow-back section, to be open to vacuum during polishing.
When the precoat is consumed its blow-back section is turned on to
remove the remaining precoat heel over the doctor blade.
A valveless design in which there is no bridge setting and the sealing
between the rotating drum and the stationary outlet is by
circumferential "o" rings rather than by a face seal used on
conventional valves.
The clearance between the drum deck and the agitator on conventional drum
filters is sufficient to accommodate cakes of up to about 50 mm while on
modern precoat filters higher clearances to allow the formation of 150 mm
precoats are quite common.
The internal drum piping on conventional drum filters is sized for relatively
low hydraulic loadings. On precoat filters, as opposed to conventional filters,
the filtrate rates during the precoating stage are high so often more cross
section of internal piping is available to reduce head loss.

The flowscheme of a Precoat Filter Station will generally look like this:

Selection Criteria
Precoat filters are generally used in the following cases:

Solutions that require a very high degree of clarity.

The solids content is very low and less than 2-3%.
The solids are sticky and would otherwise clog the filter cloth.

Operational Sequence
The operation of a precoat filter is done in two stages:

Precoating stage
Polishing stage

The two stages are closely related since the efficient and economical performance of
the filter in the polishing stage depends entirely on the selection of a suitable filter
aid and the care taken during the precoating stage.

Precoating
An 8-10% precoat slurry is prepared by feeding the selected filter aid to a tank filled
with water and equipped with a low speed mixer, such as a sweep-arm agitator, that
rotates at 30-50 rpm. The low speed is necessary in order to avoid the breakage of
the fine skeletal or expanded rock structure.
A precoat cake, depending on its permeability, may contain about 50% moisture so it
is sometime advisable to prepare the slurry with polished filtrate rather than with
water. Two arguments exist in favor of the filtrate option:

The amount of dry diatomite in the wet cake is 310 Kg/m3 (for coarse
diatomite) and 370 Kg/m3 (for fine diatomite) so, if we assume a 150 mm
precoat then it may contain some 50 Kg/m2 water. Therefore, on a middle
sized filter of 20 m2 the amount of water for downstream evaporation is 1 ton
and this must be taken in consideration.
With filtrate the transition from precoating to polishing does not necessitate
the emptying of the tank whilst with water the tank must be drained in order
not to dilute the solution.

When the alternative to water is preferred attention must be given to the specific
gravity of the filtrate since difficulty may arise while attempting to wet and mix the
light filter aid in a solution of say 52% CaBr2 having a specific gravity of 1.7. In such
a case the solution of using a high speed mixer is not desirable since, as mentioned
above, particle breakage may occur so using an eductor to enhance wetting is a
better method .
There are some basic rules to observe during the precoating of the drum in order to
ensure that the filter aid is evenly distributed and the formed bed is tight and crack
free:

When precoating commences the cake resistance is low therefore the vacuum
pump should be capable to deliver a very high air flow and in some
installations a separate vacuum pump is dedicated just for the precoating
stage.
The precoat filtrate pump should be capable of pumping the slurry at a pipe
velocity of 1.5-2.0 m/sec to avoid segregation and the settling of the heavier
filter aid particles.
For the same reason the drum should be rotated at a high speed.
The weir in the overflow box should be lowered so that the drum is barely
submerged and the bed does not form too fast. A fast forming precoat is
generally uneven in thickness and requires substantial "shaving" prior to
feeding the contaminated solution in the polishing stage. Likewise, a precoat
that forms too fast tends to crack so filtrate clarity may deteriorate and the
cloth under such cracks may blind .

The doctor blade must be retracted to the maximum clearance between drum
deck and agitator and then advanced slowly to smoothen the bed's surface in
preparation for the polishing stage.
Vacuum should never be cut-off during precoating (or polishing for that
matter) since the heavy cake will most certainly fall off the drum into the tank
with all the consequences. A rule of thumb suggests that to hold a 100 mm
wet precoat to the drum a vacuum of 180-200 mmHg is required.
The filter cloth acts merely as a support for the precoat that forms when
precoating commences and then the already formed thin layer takes over.
Therefore, the cloth should be sufficiently dense to retain the forming bed
depending to a large extent on the particle distribution of the selected filter
aid.

Polishing
The insoluble contaminants, which are often slimy and gelatinous in nature, cause
fast media blinding and soon reduce filtrate rate to a trickle. Hence, the operating
principle of polishing is to avoid formation of a thick layer but rather form a very thin
layer that is removed continuously by shaving it off.
This requires careful optimization since polishing is an expensive operation. The
optimum conditions are:

Select a precoat material that is permeable enough to yield a high filtrate rate
but dense enough to avoid the penetration of the contaminants into the
precoat bed.
Set the Doctor Blade to the lowest advance speed so that it barely cuts into
the precoat bed since deep penetration of the insoluble matter increases
diatomite consumption and shortens the polishing cycle.

Maintenance
All the points mentioned in the section related to conventional Drum Filters also
apply to Precoat Filters but some additional requirements should be observed:

Diatomacueos earth or perlite are abrasive materials and the Doctor Blade's
edge must be kept sharp otherwise the cut is not smooth and vibrations to
the fine discharge mechanism may be experienced. A ground and polished
seam of stellite is often welded along the edge to prolong the life of the blade.
Good practice is to manufacture the blade from short segments since practice
shows that the wear is not equal across the drum's face. Preferably, these
segments should be manufactured with two sharp edges so that when one
edge wears out it may be turned 180 degrees thus doubling the time required
for replacement.
The moving parts of a rake type reciprocating agitator have many bearings
that once they wear out the entire filter is subjected to shocks and shakes.
This situation is dangerous since during the precoating stage the vacuum is

relatively low and the forming bed may drop-off so special precautions should
be taken to inspect the bearings as part of the preventive maintenance
schedule.