V

The issues involved in conveying powder

acuum
conveying

ompared to its alternatives, dilute phase vacuum

conveying offers several advantages including energy efficiency, low maintenance, few moving parts,
minimal product degradation, excellent material containment, and ease of system configuration. As a result, vacuum
conveying enjoys widespread use in a range of applications,
including filling silos and day bins, moving a single material
to multiple points or multiple materials to a single destination, batch feeding to mixers or other equipment, and supplying process feeders.
However, bulk material processors who routinely convey pellets, granules, regrind or fibers by
vacuum often encounter difficulties when
conveying powders. By their nature, powders pose a different conveying challenge
their smaller particle size, flowability character istics, and environmental concer ns
demand careful consideration of several specific aspects of system design. This article
briefly highlights issues of particular importance to the conveying of powders every
plant or process engineer should be aware of
to ensure successful and trouble-free operation.

whose general tendency is to flow freely, the range of flowability characteristics of powders is broad, spanning the gamut
from free flowing to hard-to-flow.The familiar pick-up wand
is typically used for entraining materials from drums, bags,
boxes, octabins, gaylords, etc., and provides the operator the
flexibility to easily change materials simply by moving the
wand from one container to another. For very free-flowing
powders, a manual pick-up wand may suffice; however, if the
powder has any tendency to rathole or bridge, the use of a
wand can be problematic.
A pick-up spike is used to entrain material from more permanent pick-up sources such as hoppers, bag
dump stations, and big bag unloaders. The
scope of materials that can be conveyed with a
spike versus a wand is generally greater
because the material can be pre-conditioned
in the storage container above the collection
box using flow aids such as fluidizing air or
vibrators. Many powders with intermediate
flowability characteristics will still require at
least some flow assistance for entrainment into
a spike.
Wands or spikes often prove ineffective in
entraining more difficult powders. In addition
to the use of flow aids in the storage device
of the material being conThe ins and outs of powder conveying Regardless
itself, hard-to-flow powders typically require
veyed, be sure to provide easy access to
As with any type of material, sizing a vacuum receivers for maintenance convenience.
the flow augmentation provided by screw
conveying system (determining appropriate
feeders or rotary valves to assure consistent
line diameters, valve type/capacity, and pump size for the parentrainment. Additionally, depending on the powder
ticular application) is an exercise best left to the system supinvolved, special steep-walled or cone-shaped hoppers may
plier.
be required to improve outflow.
For powders in particular, the main challenges are how to
Since no conveying can take place until the material first
get the material into the system, how to separate it from the
enters the system, material testing at the design stage is the
conveying air, and how to get it out of the receiver to its
best way to guarantee the optimal entrainment solution.
intended destination.

Separation
Entrainment
Unlike larger particulate materials like pellets or granules

Once transported from its supply point to the receiver, the

material must be separated from the conveying air. For pellets

Vacuum Conveying

and other large particulate materials, the reduced air velocity

within the receiver is insufficient to maintain the particles in
suspension, and most drop to the bottom of the receiver. A
bag, pancake or pleated cartridge filter, sized on the basis of air
throughput, blocks the path of any particles that do not drop
out of suspension. Typically, an automatic backwash system
periodically cleans the filter. For powders, however, a much
smaller proportion of particles spontaneously drop out of suspension, and the demand on the filter becomes correspondingly greater.
To capture the numerous small powder particles remaining in suspension, traditional vacuum receivers employ a low
2:1 to 5:1 air-to-cloth ratio, increasing the pressure drop
across the filter and reducing efficiency. Some modern
receivers overcome this difficulty by creating an airflow vortex within the receiver that efficiently separates the vast
majority of particulates from the air stream. With this
approach particle sizes greater than 200 microns can be separated without the use of a filter.And where particle size is less
than the 200-micron threshold, the filter can be designed
more compactly and with a much higher air-to-cloth ratio of
12:1 to 20:1, increasing efficiency and permitting HEPAlevel mesh sizes.

required discharge rate. In addition, the discharge valve must

be appropriate to the downstream process. For example, if the
receiver is directly re-filling a loss-in-weight feeder, the valve
must have a positive shut-off mechanism that can be opened
from the refill signal of the feeder. Typical discharge valves
used for this application include pinch valves, butterfly valves,
and slide (knife) gate valves.A receiver mounted on a day bin
may use a valve that closes under vacuum and opens when no
vacuum is present, such as a duckbill or flapper valve.
While most non-powder materials will discharge from the
receiver unassisted, many fibers and powders will not. As a
result, the use of vibrators or air pads may be recommended.
Additionally, to prevent bridging/ratholing and further promote flow from the receiver, polished internal surfaces and
oversizing the diameter of the discharge may be advised.

Environmental and maintenance issues

Vacuum conveying of powders requires that special attention

be paid to environmental and maintenance issues such as dust
control and explosion risk, cleanability and sanitation, and filtering.
Low quality construction or seals can be a source of material escape during the receivers latency periods. And proper
grounding of all metal and electronic components will miniDischarge
mize explosion hazards associated with fluidized or aerated
Once successfully conveyed to the receiver, material must be
powders. A receiver designed for easy disassembly, preferably
discharged.The receivers discharge valve needs to be suitable
without tools, promotes cleanability. For food/pharmaceutical
for the material being conveyed and sized accordingly to the
applications, some suppliers offer receivers specially designed
for sanitary duty.
The periodic maintenance costs of filENTRAINMENT
SEPARATION
ter cleaning/changeover are readily idenConsider filterless separation for
coarser powders
tifiable. However, less apparent are the
Wand
Where a filter is required,
more substantial cumulative costs associevaluate options to minimize
pressure drop
ated with the reduced operational effiFor filtered systems, choose a
ciency caused by high filtration-related
quality backwash system and
provide access for periodic
pressure drops.To minimize this hidden
maintenance
cost, the use of low-pressure-drop filterDISCHARGE
Screw Feeder
less conveying should be evaluated for
Consider downstream process
materials appropriate to the technology.
Possible use of vibrators, air
pads, mechanical agitators, etc.
Rotary Valve

Spike

Assure ample discharge

diameter
Possible need for polishing
internal surface

When vacuum conveying powders, special consideration must be given to issues of entrainment, separation and discharge.

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Reprinted from Processing Magazines 2002 Powder Handling Handbook, March 2002