Mixer agitator manufacturers have had to come up with a few tricks to manage all of the complications that can arise during industrial mixing operations. Companies that require access to mixing products in their operations have realized that the use of a mixing agitator alone doesn’t always thoroughly mix products. In some cases, simply submerging a spinning agitator can result in a partial mixture; these partial Continue reading
Imagine what life would be like for you if your job was to mix hazardous industrial chemicals by hand, all day, every day of the week, for the rest of your life. We’ve come a long way since the industrial revolution, from the absence of worker safety laws, air quality regulations and other provisions for worker health and safety, but even back then there weren’t many jobs where constant hazardous chemical mixing was part of Continue reading
In terms of importance to all of the food-related tasks I need performed in my kitchen, my food processor would be beaten only by my stove and my refrigerator. My food processor has saved me countless hours of mashing, dicing, kneading and all manner of what would have been labor-intensive food preparations. The food processor can cut the time it takes to prepare something by 90%. I can then use that 90% that I saved on cooking other things. If my food processor is so Continue reading
My dad is one to pun. To a crippling, nauseating, excessive extent, he can turn the most basic, boring conversation into an opportunity to make a horrible pun. As a young kid, when I would ask him if he would please make me a grilled cheese sandwich, he would say, “Poof! You’re a grilled cheese sandwich.” At that point I would either throw something at him or leave the room. There are too many opportunities within the English language for predatory punsters. When I hear the words Continue reading
Mixer image courtesy of Cleveland Mixer.
The mobile cement mixer is a metaphor for innovation. Construction companies had a problem. Their clients needed structures built out of cement, but cement is heavy and difficult to transport. Also, when it becomes dry, it becomes impossible to work with. How could the companies economically and efficiently transport cement and use it to build structures for their clients? Put it in a big, continuously spinning mixer that keeps the Continue reading
Emulsifier image courtesy of Admix.
Compared to other kinds of less distinct mixing equipment, such as batch mixers or homogenizers, emulsifiers are used to serve a very specific purpose. Just as a review: emulsions are mixtures of at least two liquids that cannot be joined in a homogenous solution. The difference between an emulsion and a solution is that there is no dissolving of a solute into a solvent. Instead, emulsions are mixtures of Continue reading
Batch mixer image courtesy of IKA.
The term “batch mixer” is kind of an imprecise term. If you were to look in Google’s image search function and search for an image of a batch mixer, you’d see a wide variety of products that don’t really look like each other. There might be mixers with rotating chambers that look like the cement mixers you might see at construction sites. You could also see simple mixers that look, from the outside, like suspended hoppers or funnels. Or, you could see batch mixers that look like the mixer in the image above. There’s a reason why there’s so much variability when it comes to Continue reading
Agitator image courtesy of Patterson Industries (Canada) Ltd.
“Agitator” is kind of an ironic name for a thing that actually is used to induce harmony amongst many different materials. I’ll think of the easiest example I can in order to prove my point. And bear this assurance in mind: I promise this will relate to industry’s uses for agitators. I love guacamole, and I’ve found that the process is the least time-consuming and labor-intensive when I use my food processor. When I lay all of the ingredients out on the counter, there’s chaos there. Unpeeled avocados, un-skinned onions, packages of ingredients unopened and limes un-squeezed. What I have before me at this stage is a decidedly heterogeneous mixture of ingredients. When it comes to making guacamole, heterogeneousity is chaos. I don’t want the relationship between my Continue reading
Mixing blade image courtesy of Marion Mixers.
There are many different kinds of industrial mixers, and this is because the need for mixing processes is varied. For example, the kind of mixing equipment required for pharmaceutical ingredients mixing would not necessarily be appropriate for the mixing of petrochemical products. Because the need for industrial mixing equipment can vary from one situation to another, engineers in the industrial mixer research and development field have developed a number of different industrial mixer configurations to meet Continue reading