IMPROVEMENT OF THE PERFORMANCE OF AN EXISTING FATLIQUOR PILOT PLANT

IMPROVEMENT OF THE PERFORMANCE OF AN EXISTING FATLIQUOR PILOT PLANT

Abstract:

Experimental and theoretical investigations were conducted on an existing sulphation pilot plant facility for production of leather lubricant, sulphated oil popularly known as fatliquor. This was carefully and critically done to evaluate the performance of the plant in respect of attaining the required process conditions. These include maintaining the sulphation reaction temperature of 25°C to reduce side reactions to enhance optimum yield of the desired product. In addition, the study evaluated the possibility of using the plant for as much smaller feed as possible, per batch of production, to reduce cost of experimentation on the plant. The test-runs revealed some design Lapses, such as the reaction temperature rising up to 41″C in the three test runs that were done. This may indict the cooling system that was earlier on, observed to have placed serious restriction on wide variation of process input required of a research project. A redesign of the cooling system was done as part of the investigations to confirm the observed under-functioning. The redesign

IMPROVEMENT OF THE PERFORMANCE OF AN EXISTING FATLIQUOR PILOT PLANT