New facility: storage and conveying of sugar

Storage and conveying for dissolving sugar in a cast iron tank

Company
French company specialized in the manufacture of spirits and syrups.

Materials handled
Crystal beet sugar delivered by tanker truck, and cane sugar packaged in 1,000 and 1,200 kg bulk bags.

Solution
The installation concerns a complete crystal sugar storage and conveying line to a sugar dissolution unit for the manufacture of syrups. The manufacture of syrups with cane or beet sugar is not simultaneous. Also, the operation of this installation must be different depending on the type of sugar handled: (1) automatic for beet sugar; (2) semi-automatic for cane sugar.
The line must meet the following constraints:
. No cross-contamination of products
. No or little product loss
. Product changeover times reduced to a minimum

Sugar beet storage and transfer unit
Crystal sugar, of beet origin, is conveyed by tanker into a storage silo with a capacity of 115 m³. The storage silo is fitted with a level probe, a vibrating bottom to facilitate product flow and a manually operated knife gate valve to interrupt powder flowing at any time.
The material is transferred by means of a mechanical tubular screw, with a diameter of 219 mm, positioned at the silo intake and which ensures a mass flow of 5 000 kg/h.
A gearbox is positionned at the outlet of the dosing screw to convey the product to the pneumatic transfer with remote filter.
A line purge system is installed to prevent cross-contamination in the piping. An automatic valve closes and stops the powder flow so the entire pipework is evacuated. The valve is then instantly reopened to remove the remaining air/product mixture from the piping.

Cane sugar emptying and conveying unit
Cane sugar is delivered in bulk bags of 1 000 and 1 200 kg. To avoid the operation of unpacking the flexible containers, PALAMATIC PROCESS has installed a bulk bag emptying station, fitted with a self-supporting chassis to support the weight of the bulk bags, an electric hoist on a rail for easy handling by the operators or a tray to optimise the flow. This emptying station, designed for manual opening of all types of bulk bags, limits dust emissions to a minimum for a healthy working atmosphere.
A conveying screw takes the product to the sugar dissolving unit.

The pneumatic transfer system with remote filter VFlow:
The processed products, beet and cane sugar, are sucked into a continuous discharge cyclone via a rotary lock to the dissolution tank. The remote cyclo-filter recovers the fines and reintroduces them into the process. This pneumatic transfer system offers many advantages:

. Conveying of so-called difficult products
. High throughput conveying
. Possibility to separate the fines
. Reuse of fines in the process
. Protection of the filter against possible rising of steam during reactor loading.