Eliminating Downtime from Your Industrial Dust Collector Operations

A poorly performing industrial dust collector is more often than not, a result of very high dust loading, ineffective cleaning, or both. If left unchecked for a long time, these problems can result in unplanned downtime and increased operating costs.

When using an industrial dust collector for your business needs. It has to be put on emphasis just how much the firm loses when this happens. This article will talk about ways to eliminate this downtime and to ensure smooth industrial dust collection of your Goyen Valves products from here on out.

While this is not necessarily an exhaustive rollout of potential issues, listed in this article is a handy checklist of measures. You and your staff can then use these to avoid costly shutdowns and frequent filter changes but first let us understand just how much downtime costs.

How much Dust Collector Downtime really Costs

A recent study conducted a survey of auto industry manufacturing executives have shown that the stopped production costs a staggering $22,000 per minute on average. A study that had the same premise found that of the facilities that can calculate the cost of downtime. And the surprising conclusion was that most underestimate it by about 3 times less. Keeping this in mind, think about what happens when an industrial dust collector goes down. The most logical conclusion would be that it will almost always take its associated system down with it. Clearly, in many facilities dust collectors used for pollution control must operate at all times as that is how most dust collection systems work. And any malfunction that results from a mandatory shutdown of the entire process and even the facility will cause detrimental effect to the entire production. Such is the cost of downtimes which runs into the tens of thousands per minute in most cases. We can see that these costs by far are so much more than the average costs to maintain the dust collector properly.

As we try to understand the cost of downtime it should be noted that an hour or shift is measured in the thousands while properly maintaining an industrial dust collector is way less expensive.

It is still true however that many facilities devote only limited resource, if any, resources to preventative maintenance for their dust collectors despite the vital role they play. Here are a few tips that can help you prevent downtime that may be caused by dust collectors in your industrial facility and cause you dollars in lost revenue.

Stop Abrasion From Damaging Your Dust Collector Bags

During operations, an abrasion can occur whenever the incoming dust impacts the bags. This often happens when industrial dust approaches the bags at high volume or high speed. This can also happen due to the physical contact between the filters of the dust collector and some other parts of the unit. These parts can include the filters which can bang against each other, the filter cage rubbing against the filter, among others. Abrasion is the main cause of bags wearing earlier than intended and thus the leaks which require a shutdown to find and replace.

The abrasion that is caused by incoming dust can be prevented by the use of baffle plates. These plates distribute the incoming air more evenly and slow it down which will cause the most of the dust particles to fall away even before reaching the filters. Furthermore, the proper inlet design can help prevent the air from directly causing impact upon entry on the bags. And lastly, in some cases, it is noted that the use of pleated filter technology is able to raise filters up and out of the path of the incoming particulate laden industrial dust. This proves a larger drop out zone to allow for the air which slows the larger particles and causes the drop out.

Replace The Entire Set of Bags and Refrain From Endless Spot Changing

It is quite a common occurrence, but is very shortsighted mistake to try to avoid replacing entire sets of filters. Most of the people in the industry instead only try replace individual filters as they spring leaks. Instead of saving money, this activity actually creates substantial amounts of downtime. And this is not including the raise in overall particulate emissions it creates. If the leaks are not caught at an earlier stage, the industrial dust collector operation can lead to a situation where maintenance personnel are constantly putting out fires. What should be done is to be proactive so as to see good operation from the systems.

It is actually sometimes better to use new filters so you can even fail faster. The rationale for this is that since a new filter goes in the midst of a group of older, dirtier, more seasoned filters, the lower resistance causes more air to rush through it and the surrounding filters. Hence, these filters will in turn fail at an earlier time than all the other existing filters in the unit.

The rule of thumb when it comes to replacement of bags is that when you have spot changed more than 5% to 10% of the total bags in a unit, then it might be best for you to replace the entire set. Ultimately this will help prevent the cascade of early bag failures which comes with continually spot changing of filters.