Particle separation remains a critical process across various industries, enabling the removal of unwanted materials and extracting valuable components. This includes separating valuable ores from rocks, wheat from chaff, or impurities from water during treatment processes. Today, industrial applications rely on these methods to achieve efficiency and precision in material processing.
Techniques for particle separation are based on distinct properties, such as chemistry, density, shape, mass, and size. These methods are pivotal in modern manufacturing and production, ensuring optimal material quality and supporting diverse industrial operations.
Particle Separation Methods Past, Present & Future
Various particle separation methods have been used throughout history in various industries, from agriculture to mining and products from pharmaceuticals to recycled plastics. Separation processes are used to remove contaminants or other impurities, as well as to select the most desirable materials from those less desirable ones.
Particle separation methods used historically and currently include:
- Centrifugation: By rotating material at very high speeds, centrifugation combines centrifugal force with an array of mechanisms to separate mixtures by scalping and sifting material, the results varying due to the density, shape, size, and speed of a rotor.
- Filtration: This particle separation method divides larger and smaller solid or liquid particles within a material by passing it through a porous filtering device, which can be as simple as a filter made from paper.
- Flotation: Used to separate solids from a bulk liquid, it generally involves separating suspended materials from a slurry via air bubbles generated naturally from within the mixture or due to mechanical agitation of the liquid.
- Handpicking: A traditional particle separation method used for thousands of years to separate an unwanted material from a desirable one, or to simply separate two different yet useful materials.
- Magnetic separation: A particle separation method developed in the 19th century to separate magnetic from nonmagnetic materials through various means, a technique still widely used in the metal recycling industry today. Magnetic separation can also be used to remove metal contaminants in other materials.
- Sieving: This technique involves passing the material through perforated mesh to remove impurities or separate material by particle size. This particle separation method, once manually, now employs machines like rotary sieves to separate smaller and larger particles within a bulk solid.
- Threshing: Used to separate smaller particles from within a mixture, threshing is a separation technique used to remove grains from their stalks, previously performed by beating stalks on the ground to separate the seeds from them; this particle separation method is still used for removing seeds when processing hemp.
- Winnowing: Originally using a winnowing basket and wind for particle separation, methods of classification today that use moving air are often referred to as air classifiers, typically used for various finer materials.
Particle separation methods are essential for many industrial processes, with modern techniques enabling greater efficiency and reducing waste. Manufacturers continue to foster technologies that augment the processing of bulk materials in conjunction with material scientists, mechanical engineers, and others involved in developing material handling equipment.
Future Trends in Particle Separation
In the future, particle separation methods will remain a fundamental part of many bulk material processes used by multiple industries. The most desirable technologies for particle separation applications are those that precisely analyze material and adjust processes in real-time to control the final product's quality better. This often entails setting aside or purifying materials during applications relating to particle separation. Methods for separating bulk materials continue to evolve to incorporate these new technologies, supporting greater sustainability. In nearly every application concerning bulk material processing, separation methods continue to evolve.
Automation
The future systems used to separate materials will continue to integrate automated technology. Unlike automated systems, which began to appear a half-century ago, this automation will involve less hardware and more software. Instead, hardware and software will connect seamlessly, featuring connected solutions and advanced sensing technologies known collectively as the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT).
IIoT technology is already changing how many industries process bulk materials, with separation methods augmented by these advances. Connectivity within processing systems will allow sensors to communicate directly with control systems to optimize operations. Cloud-based software will enable management of multiple machines, processes, or even facilities from a single location. This allows for a more holistic view of production, enabling more effective decision-making process.
Advanced Composite Construction Materials
Material handling systems increasingly use composite materials to construct integrated machinery. Advanced composites often offer corrosion resistance, greater strength, and lower weight, making them better choices for building equipment used for particle separation. Methods for developing new composite construction materials for material handling equipment will add to their durability while also easing production issues.
Advanced Membrane Technology
Usually considered tertiary for material separation, methods involving membranes are being used for reverse osmosis and within hybrid systems for separating material. Separation methods using advanced membrane technology must first deal with challenges like high initial costs for making these novel materials, such as organic polymers like cellulose acetate, inorganic materials like graphene. Used in the processing of certain gases and liquids, these membranes are useful for water treatment and seawater desalination applications. While also touted as a solution for the oil and gas industry, advanced membranes will likely feature in particle separation methods in producing biofuels too.
Filtration-as-a-Service & Other Third-Party Providers
Technology companies have used the as-a-service model since the late 1990s, with software-as-a-service (SaaS) providers largely replacing other business models over the past quarter century. However, many companies involved in material processing have also turned to third parties for particle separation. Methods for vendor-based separation processes, such as filtration-as-a-service (FaaS), allow companies to use innovative filtration techniques optimized by data gathered via connected monitoring devices and other modern technology.
However, in a sense, the material handling sector has been performing such services since the 19th century, when mills processed grain for a share of a farmer’s crops. As is the case with many other companies involved in bulk material processing, third parties will increasingly perform separation methods. Many of these outsourced processes will be performed in future on contract or through toll processing arrangements with companies equipped with the most advanced equipment.
Machine Learning Algorithms
A close cousin to artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning algorithms already enable predictive maintenance, helping monitoring systems detect faults in real time and before they become major problems. Machines that can learn and adjust to changing production conditions are already in use and will eventually become an endemic part of machinery used for particle separation. Methods for predicting maintenance of machinery within industrial processing systems additionally help enhance efficiency and increase uptime. The algorithms concerned allow systems to adapt automatically and in real time to fluctuations in the production environment, leading to greater productivity.
Magnetic Separation
Though stemming from the 19th century, magnetic separation technology is also advancing. It’s already in use for processes involving particle separation. Methods employing this technology help remove metallic contaminants along conveying systems in various industries. Yet these pioneering uses for magnetic systems look to shape the mining sector the most, with research into developing mobile machinery for particle separation. Mining methods can benefit from this portability, which is likely a boon for extraction in remote locations and smaller operations. Additionally, rare earth magnets are being developed to improve particle separation methods, especially for less magnetic and finer materials.
Robotic Automation
Automated hardware will continue to enhance efficiency with collaborative robots that can work in conjunction and safely within close proximity of human workers. All material-handling systems will be connected to IIoT-enhanced systems that optimize operations. With machines used for particle separation, methods for directing their actions may even feature technologies that recognize voice commands or gestures, making their activation and operation more straightforward and more user-friendly.
Tailored Solutions
Equipment customized for a specific purpose outclasses more commonplace options relating to particle separation. Methods for tailoring machines to meet a customer’s needs are the most innovative equipment manufacturers. By collaborating closely with customers, a manufacturer can come up with the best solutions to enhance the performance and efficiency of a process. Experimenting with unique particle separation methods and technologies is often key to developing superior results for an application.
Particle Separation: Methods & Technologies for the Future
Particle separation methods and technologies will continue progressing, promoting efficiency that augments sustainability with systems designed to minimize waste generation and conserve energy use.
With smart membranes made from nanomaterials and machinery made with novel composites, changes in construction materials will also affect how these machines are made. For equipment used in particle separation, methods used to fabricate new material handling equipment will gradually incorporate digital twin technology, advancing designs through simulations that tailor machinery to specific applications. Modular designs that enable easier maintenance and more rapid scalability will become the norm, as much by economics as anything else.
Training workers by equipment manufacturers will become normal, a part of the support and service to customers who need to adapt their older manufacturing techniques to these new technologies. As advanced particle separation methods are scaled, the inevitable challenges faced by adapting to new industrial technologies will become ever more apparent. For this reason, there will likely be little change in the collaboration between industry and academic institutions, along with funding provided by government-led initiatives.
Prater Industries: Innovative Particle Separation Methods
As a leading material handling equipment manufacturer, Prater Industries takes a multifaced approach to developing machinery used in particle separation. Methods for segregating useful materials from useless or less useful substances often require custom solutions, to which Prater is committed. Not only is our comprehensive range of processing equipment pioneering in design, but Prater’s customer-specific innovations cater to various industrial requirements. Due to the knowledge gleaned from a century in the material processing industry, Prater is well-positioned to retain its position among the best suppliers of innovative particle separation machinery for customers across many sectors.
Prater’s particle separation equipment includes:
- Centrifugal sifters: Using a blade-induced spreading action to reduce binding issues, this machine handles flaky and moister or fattier agglomerated material during processes that entail particle separation; methodical classifying, scalping and sifting out foreign material like string, plastic or insects is performed with adjustable paddles that provide the centrifugal force.
- MAC air classifier: Particle separation methods of centrifugal force and drag allow smaller and more aerodynamic particles to traverse the machine, while larger and denser particles gather in the cyclonic space until discharged via a rotary airlock fitted below the machine; the MAC can act as a standalone system or connect with a standard milling system.
- Mini-split air classifier: Developed for more modest production throughputs or semiconductor applications, this air classifier works well for tighter spaces, producing very little noise while its smaller size allows greater mobility.
Though there are imminent changes regarding particle separation methods, some things will remain the same. Prater will continue designing dependable and durable machines and systems that endure the harshest industrial conditions. Along with the precision engineering that goes into all our products, our company is committed to a customer-centric approach. Within our testing facilities, we help customers test innovative particle separation methods and the resulting product. Prater additionally helps ensure consistency and provides technical support for our customers whenever needed. To learn more about what we can do for you, contact the material handling experts at Prater today.
