Food & beverage

Because modern high-pressure boilers evaporate several million pounds of water every working hour, the purity of feedwater circulating inside the boiler is essential. Chemical treatment reduces scale-forming materials and corrosive oxygen content. A Feedwater Evaporator can be used as an alternative method to chemicals by removing impurities through evaporating raw water with extraction steam. Most often, the purity of feedwater is achieved by chemical treatment. Challenge Because support chemicals for water treatment can include caustics, sodium hypochloride, sulfuric acid or other additives, individual chemistry and storage requirements will dictate the level instrumentation selected.

Continuous Liquid level measurement of fermenter anti-foam vessels. Challenge The customer required continuous, reliable/repeatable level measurement in 2 x anti foam vessels to ensure that the anti-foam level was maintained correctly to support the upstream fermentation process. Each vessel is only 300mm diameter and 1200mm in height, with a bottom, centrally mounted, agitator 600mm in height. The required vessel entry is a (fairly unusual) side mounted DN25 DIN 2633 connection. Solution Magnetrol manufactured probes with the required DIN 2633 flanges, bent at 90 degrees (see pictures) that (as with all their hygienic GWR) could be separated from the flange assembly and reassembled once the probe is inserted into the vessel. After the simple installation procedure, the Magnetrol probes were quickly commissioned using Pactware configuration software. Simple configuration changes allowed us to reliably and repeatedly measure the anti-foam level whilst completely ignoring the 90 degree bend in our probe and the influence of the agitator and vessel wall-both less than 25mm from the probes.

Two tanks (52’ Tall – Light Viscosity – 500 cP, and 40’ Tall – High Viscosity – 180000 cP) stored high fructose corn syrup for manufacturing processes that required accurate level measurement. Challenge The customer was using a pressure sensor at the base of their tanks to measure level. The sensor would become covered with the syrup and would not accurately measure the level, causing their inventory to be off significantly. The specific gravity of the product also varied, giving them accuracy issues. This inaccuracy was causing inventory and accounting mistakes. Solution Since the tanks were 52’ and 40’ tall and only about 12’ in diameter, we needed to use Guided Wave Radar technology for continuous level measurement.We used singlecable flexible probe for the light corn syrup application and a twin-cable flexible probe for the heavy corn syrup, due to the pull down force on the antenna when the HFCS was cold.Each unit was sold with a Precision Digital PD6000-6R5 – 2 Relays & 4-20 mA Out =- 85-265 VAC & 24 VDC Transmitter Supply and Precision Digital PD2811 – Plastic NEMA 4 Enclosure for 1?8 DIN Meters. These units powered the radars, sent a 4–20mA signal to their control room and had high level alarm relay points.They benefited by having excellent control over their inventory. This saved them time and money.

Level measurement of liquid cream cheese reservoir on a filling/packaging line Challenge Our customer currently has huge problems with a competitors capacitance probe which is unable to cope with both product buildup and changing dielectric properties as the filling line changes from one product to the next. All too often, the filling reservoir does not have enough product to fill the programmed throughput, which then leads to huge amounts of waste product as pots get under filled or not filled at all, and are subsequently rejected by the check weighing system. Recently our customer has employed an operator to manually manipulate the controlling PLC on a permanent basis- a huge cost in terms of man hours. Solution Magnetrol supplied a 380mm long, single rod, GWR probe with DN40 DIN 11851 process connection. This was installed quickly and easily, then calibrated using Pact ware-all in less than 30 minutes The Magnetrol GWR worked flawlessly from the moment it was set into operation as our GWR has absolutely no issues with changing product or build up in this application. The customer has successfully run his filling line on all products without the need for any manual intervention and virtually no product loss attributed to poor level control. By using our GWR the customer has saved significant amounts of money in reduced labour cost and product loss.

Level Measurement of a liquid nutritional supplement in a vessel that feeds a reservoir on a filling machine. Challenge Level was being measured by a competitors capacitance probe. The vessel is a tall narrow tube that feeds product to a high speed filling machine. Product enters the vessel through a side-mounted tee connection. The measurement was unreliable, resulting in improperly filled containers. This resulted in lost production and time while certain containers did not meet spec.After examining the application, we concluded that the fluid entering through the tee connection was splashing against the probe, thus giving false level readings. Solution This was a perfect application for an Eclipse Model 705 with the coaxial probe. Since the measurement is made entirely within the probe, it is unaffected by splashing or any disturbance outside the probe. Additionally, the fluid is not viscous so that did not cause a concern.An Eclipse with coaxial probe was installed, configured with PACTware™ and worked perfectly from day one. The level measurement was accurate and reliable.

Guided Wave Radar for Spirit Storage Level Measurement and Agitator Control. Challenge The customer needs a reliable and SIL certified level measurement device to accurately measure the level in his spirit storage vessel to prevent the liquid level being allowed to drop below the agitator point. Another requirement is to stop manual, twice daily, “dipping” of the vessel to improve inventory control and remove lone working (in a hazardous area) health and safety issues. Solution Magnetrol supplied, segmented, coax probes to enable easy handling and installation for the customer. We also used enhanced electronics to provide the required SIL rating for the measurement system. The probes were installed effortlessly and, because they were pre-calibrated, commissioning, of all 5 systems, was completed in less than 1 hour. The measurement has proven to be extremely reliable as it is completely unaffected by external factors within the vessel – such as the filling stream and product agitation. This has provided our customer with considerable installation and commissioning cost savings as well as long term cost benefits in no longer having to rely on manual “dipping”, improved inventory control and removal of lone working (in a hazardous area) health and safety issues.