Metal cleaning made easy: A fluidized bed system is a cost-effective option fordegreasing processes

Traditional degreasing processes employ chlorinated solvents in a liquid or vapor state in order to remove oils and oil-borne soils from previously processed parts, such as chips, metal, fines, and fluxes. Nevertheless, increased sensitivity to the environmental impacts of cleaning agents has led to alternative cleaning processes. A novel and unpublished eco-efficient degreasing technique has been analyzed in this study, namley, suface cleaning by means of a fluidized bed of hard particles. A spherical-shaped glass powder with variable mesh sizes in the range of 100 to 800 microns was fluidized. The impact of fluidized particles on the metal substrate caused accurate cleaning of the suface of the workpiece without involving the use of any solvents and without damaging the suface of the part to be degreased. Attention was paid on the correlation between process parameters and the effectiveness of the cleaning operation. By experimentation, the trend of the removal rate over time was successfully plotted for several operative conditions.