Roll No 22-10561

Submitted To Dr Muhammad Saeed Iqbal

Submitted by Sana Anayat
Course Title 320
Assignment Filter press
Forman Christian College And University

What is Filter press

An industrial filter press is a tool used in separation
processes, specifically to separate solids and liquids.
The process uses the principle of pressure drive, as
provided by a slurry pump. Among other uses, filter
presses are utilized in marble factories in order to
separate water from mud in order to reuse the water
during the marble cutting process. Filter press is a piece
of sludge dewatering equipment that separates liquids
and solids using pressure filtration. When working
slurry is pumped into the filter press and dewatered
under pressure.
The filter press is supplied for a wide application in
municipal & industrial industries. Feed mud
concentration always be 30%-40%, then mud will
become mud cake and the humidity is around 20%
after processed by the filter press.
The 8 main components of a filter press:
Hydraulic Station(Hydraulic Systems),
Cylinder,
Pressing Plate,
Beam,
Filter Plates,
Push Plate,
Filter Cloths,
Filter Press Pump.
The terms used to describe the components may vary
slightly from different manufacturers, but the main
function still remain the same.

Concept behind filter press technology

Generally, the slurry that will be separated is injected
into the center of the press and each chamber of the
press is filled. Optimal filling time will ensure the last
chamber of the press is loaded before the mud in the
first chamber begins to cake. As the chambers fill,
pressure inside the system will increase due to the
formation of thick sludge. Then, the liquid is strained
through filter cloths by force using pressurized air,
but the use of water could be more cost-efficient in
certain cases, such as if water was re-used from a
previous process.

History
The first form of filter press was invented in the
United Kingdom in 1853, used in obtaining seed oil
through the use of pressure cells. However, there were
many disadvantages associated with them, such as
high labour requirement and discontinuous process.
Major developments in filter press technology started
in the middle of 20th century. In Japan in 1958,
Kenichiro Kurita and Seiichi Suwa succeeded in
developing the world's first automatic horizontal-type
filter press to improve the cake removal efficiency and
moisture absorption. Nine years later, Kurita
Company began developing flexible diaphragms to
decrease moisture in filter cakes. The device enables
optimisation of the automatic filtration cycle, cake
compression, cake discharge and filter-cloth washing
leading to the increment in opportunities for various
industrial applications. A detailed historical review,
dating back to when the Shang Dynasty used presses
to extract tea from camellia the leaves and oil from the
hips in 1600 BC, was compiled by K. McGrew.

How Does Filter Press Work?

Slurry is pumped into the filter press, the mixture flows
through the filter medium (filter cloth), the solids stay
on the filter cloth, forming filter cake; the filtrate exits
the filter plates through the corner ports into the
manifold, If it is not wanted the filtrate can be drained
away for safe disposal.
Filter presse is a pressure filtration method, when filter
press feed pump builds pressure, solids build up in
chambers until they are completely chock-full of. Once
the chambers are full of solids, a cycle is over and the
filter cakes will release. Our plate and frame filter
presses are designed for bad environment such as
mines or chemical manufacturing plants, which can 24-
hour operation.
A FILTER PRESS HAS FOUR MAIN COMPONENTS:

Frame: The steel frame acts as a clamping device for

the filter plates.
(A)Filter Plates: A filter cake forms in the chambers
between filter plates

(B)Manifold: Our standard manifold consists of piping

and valves which control the slurry inlet and connect
the four corners filtrate discharge ports into a common
discharge pipe.

(C)Filter Cloth: A cloth filter that is attached to both

sides of a filter plate. Solids build up on cloth to form a
filter cake, separating liquids from solids.
How Does It Works?
FILLING CYCLE: Slurry is pumped into the filter press.
The solids are distributed evenly on the filter cloths
during the feed (fill) cycle.
FILTRATION CYCLE
Solids start to deposit on the filter cloth, trapping the
ensuing particles and building a filter cake. The filter
cake acts as a depth filter for solid/liquid separation.
Filtrate exit from the plates through the corner ports
into the manifold. When the correct valves in the
manifold are open, the filtrate exits the press through
the filtrate outlet. As the filter press feed pump builds
pressure, the solids build within the chambers until they
are completely full of filter cake.

CAKE WASH/AIR CYCLE

It is useful for maintaining pH value of filter cake and
decrease the moisture in filter cake. It is apply in
diagonal direction.
CAKE DISCHARGE CYCLE
Once the chambers are full, the feeding cycle is
complete and the filter press is ready to unload.

Structure of Filter press

Types of filter presses
There are four main basic types of filter presses: plate
and frame filter presses, recessed plate and frame filter
presses, membrane filter presses and (fully) automatic
filter presses.

Plate and frame filter press

A plate and frame filter press is the most fundamental
design, and many now refer it as a "membrane filter
plate". This type of filter press consists of many plates
and frames assembled alternately with the supports of
a pair of rails. The presence of a centrifuge pump
ensures the remaining suspended solids do not settle in
the system, and its main function is to deliver the
suspension into each of the separating chambers in the
plate and frame filter. For each of the individual
separating chambers, there is one hollow filter frame
separated from two filter plates by filter cloths. The
introduced slurry flows through a port in each individual
frame, and the filter cakes are accumulated in each
hollow frame. As the filter cake becomes thicker, the
filter resistance increases as well. So when the
separating chamber is full, the filtration process is
stopped as the optimum pressure difference is reached.
The filtrate that passes through filter cloth is collected
through collection pipes and stored in the filter tank.
Filter cake (suspended solid) accumulation occurs at the
hollow plate frame, then being separated at the filter
plates by pulling the plate and frame filter press apart.
The cakes then fall off from those plates and are
discharged to the final collection point.
M.W. Watermark Plate and Frame Filter Press
Cake discharge can be done in many ways. For example:
Shaking the plates while they are being opened or
shaking the cloths. A scraper can also be used, by
moving from one chamber to another and scraping the
cake off the cloth. At the end of each run, the cloths are
cleaned using wash liquid and are ready to start the
next cycle.
An early example of this is the Dehne filter press,
developed by A L G Dehne (1832–1906) of Halle,
Germany, and commonly used in the late 19th and early
20th century for extracting sugar from sugar beet and
from sugar cane, and for drying ore slurries. Its great
disadvantage was the amount of labor involved in its
operation.

(Fully) Automatic filter press

An automatic filter press has the same concept as the
manual filter and frame filter, except that the whole
process is fully automated. It consists of larger plate and
frame filter presses with mechanical "plate shifters".
The function of the plate shifter is to move the plates
and allow rapid discharge of the filter cakes
accumulated in between the plates. It also contains a
diaphragm compressor in the filter plates which aids in
optimizing the operating condition by further drying the
filter cakes.
Fully automatic filter presses provide a high degree of
automation while providing uninterrupted operation at
the same time. The option of the simultaneous filter
plate opening system, for example, helps to realise a
particularly fast cake release reducing the cycle time to
a minimum. The result is a high-speed filter press that
allows increased production per unit area of filter. For
this reason, these machines are used in applications
with highly filterable products where high filtration
speeds are required. These include, e.g. mining
concentrates and residues. There are different systems
for fully automatic operation. These include, e.g. the
vibration/shaking devices, spreader clamp/spreader
cloth version or scraping devices. The unmanned
operating time of a fully automatic filter press is 24/7.

Recessed plate filter press

A recessed plate filter press is made up of
polypropylene squares at about 2 to 4 feet across with a
concave depression and a hole in the center of each.
Two plates join together to form a chamber to
pressurize the slurry and squeeze the filtrate out
through the filter cloth lining in the chamber. It is
capable of holding 12 to 80 plates adjacent to each
other, depending on the required capacity. When the
filter press is closed, a series of chambers is formed. The
differences with the plate and frame filter are that the
plates are joined together in such a way that the cake
forms in the recess on each plate, meaning that the
cake thickness is restricted to 32mm unless extra
frames are used as spacers.However, there are
disadvantages to this method, such as longer cloth
changing time, inability to accommodate filter papers,
and the possibility of forming uneven cake.

Membrane filter press

Membrane filter presses have a great influence on the
dryness of the solid by using membrane technology in
the filter plates. Compared to conventional filtration
processes, it achieves the lowest residual moisture
values in the filter cake. This makes the membrane filter
press a powerful and the most widely used system.
Depending on the degree of dewatering, different dry
matter contents (dry matter content – percentage by
weight of dry material in the filter cake) can be
achieved in the filter cake by squeezing with membrane
plates. The range of achievable dry matter contents
extends from 30 to over 80 percent. Membrane filter
presses not only offer the advantage of an extremely
high degree of dewatering; they also reduce the
filtration cycle time by more than 50 percent on
average, depending on the suspension. This results in
faster cycle and turnaround times, which lead to an
increase in productivity. The membrane inflation
medium consists either of compressed air or a liquid
medium (e.g. water).

Rapid sand filter

Cutaway view of a typical rapid sand filter

The rapid sand filter or rapid gravity filter is a type of
filter used in water purification and is commonly used in
municipal drinking water facilities as part of a multiple-
stage treatment system.
Rapid sand filters were first developed in the 1890s, and
improved designs were developed by the 1920s.The
first modern rapid sand filtration plant was designed
and built by George W. Fuller in Little Falls, New Jersey.
[3]
Rapid sand filters were widely used in large municipal
water systems by the 1920s, because they required
smaller land areas compared to slow sand filters.

Design and operation

Rapid sand filters are typically designed as part of multi-
stage treatment systems used by large municipalities.
These systems are complex and expensive to operate
and maintain, and therefore less suitable for small
communities and developing nations. The filtration
system requires a relatively small land area in
proportion to the population served, and the design is
less sensitive to changes in raw water quality, e.g.
turbidity, than slow sand filters.
Rapid sand filters use relatively coarse sand and other
granular media to remove particles and impurities that
have been trapped in a floc through the use of
flocculation chemicals—typically alum. The unfiltered
water flows through the filter medium under gravity or
under pumped pressure and the floc material is trapped
in the sand matrix.
Mixing, flocculation and sedimentation processes are
typical treatment stages that precede filtration.
Chemical additives, such as coagulants, are often used
in conjunction with the filtration system.
The two types of rapid sand filter are the gravity type
(e.g. Paterson's filter) and pressure type (e.g. Candy's
filter).
A disinfection system (typically using chlorine or ozone)
is commonly used following filtration. Rapid sand
filtration has very little effect on taste and smell and
dissolved impurities of drinking water, unless activated
carbon is included in the filter medium.
Rapid sand filters must be cleaned frequently, often
several times a day, by backwashing, which involves
reversing the direction of the water and adding
compressed air. During backwashing, the bed is
fluidized and care must be taken not to wash away the
media.
The byproduct of backwashing is sludge which is either
tankered away or is run to waste if the composition is
within the tolerable limits. These tanks are known as
"Dirty washwater tanks".

Belt filter
Diagram of a belt filter: sludge in the feed hopper is
sandwiched between two filter cloths (shown green
and purple). Fluid is extracted initially by gravity,
then by squeezing the cloth through rollers. Filtrate
exits through a drain, while solids are scraped off into
a container.
The belt filter (sometimes called a belt press filter, or
belt filter press) is an industrial machine, used for
solid/liquid separation processes, particularly the
dewatering of sludges in the chemical industry, mining
and water treatment. Belt filter presses are also used in
the production of apple juice, cider and winemaking.[1]
The process of filtration is primarily obtained by passing
a pair of filtering cloths and belts through a system of
rollers. The system takes a sludge or slurry as a feed,
and separates it into a filtrate and a solid cake.
Applications
Filter Press Applications: Dewatering Industrial Sludge
Reclaiming Precious Metals Processing of
Pharmaceuticals Product Filtration Dewatering
Hazardous Wastes Process Waste Waters in EPA
Approved Treatment Systems

Filter Press for effluent pollution treatment plant/waste

water treatment plant in different industries Marble
waste de-watering. Pharmaceuticals industries Hotel
domestic sludge Steel tubes / wire industries Steel re-
rolling industries Textile industries PCB Circuit/switch
board industries
Filter presses are used in a huge variety of different
applications, from dewatering of mineral mining slurries
to blood plasma purification.At the same time, filter
press technology is widely established for ultrafine coal
dewatering as well as filtrate recovery in coal
preparation plants. According to G.Prat, the "filter press
is proven to be the most effective and reliable
technique to meet today's requirement". One of the
examples is Pilot scale plate filter press, which is
specialized in dewatering coal slurries. In 2013 the
Society for Mining, Metallurgy and Exploration
published an article highlighting this specific
application.It was mentioned that the use of the filter
press is very beneficial to plant operations, since it
offers dewatering ultraclean coal as product, as well as
improving quality of water removed to be available for
equipment cleaning.
Other industrial uses for automatic membrane filter
presses include municipal waste sludge dewatering,
ready mix concrete water recovery, metal concentrate
recovery, and large-scale fly ash pond dewatering.
Many specialized applications are associated with
different types of filter press that are currently used in
various industries. Plate filter press is extensively used
in sugaring operations such as the production of maple
syrup in Canada, since it offers very high efficiency and
aaffect the value of maple syrup and customer's
perception of quality". This makes the raw syrup
filtration process extremely crucial in achieving desired
product with high quality and appealing form, which
again suggested how highly appreciated filter press
methods are in industry.

THE APPLICATION OF FILTER PRESSES IN THE

MINING INDUSTRY
At Filtra-Systems, we provide industry leading
technology for various groups of companies.
Specifically, our filter presses have been used in the
mining industry for a plethora of reasons. The mining
and chemical industries have repeatedly sought out
Filtra-Systems technology to improve efficiency and
consistency.
Why does the mining industry seek out filter presses?
In the mining industry, safety standards are a high
priority. At Filtra-Systems, we provide this industry with
technology unlike any other offered on the market. Our
automatic filter presses simplify processes, improve
overall product quality, reduce energy consumption,
reduce labor requirements and increase overall
production. Not only do our automatic filter presses
save our customers money, but they also increase the
overall efficiency and productivity of their operation.
The automatic filter presses main function is dewatering
products. The filter presses separate solids from the
slurry, remove impurities through a wash cycle, dry, and
discharge the product.
Read more about the most advanced dewatering tower
filter press available here. The Verti-Press automatic
tower filter press improves the safety procedures of
your company while providing advanced technology for
your dewatering processes.
Contact a Filtra-Systems professional today! Since 1979,
we have worked endlessly to customize our products to
the needs of our customers. Need help deciding what
product may be best for your company? Ask the
professionals! We would be happy to answer any
questions you may have and recommend a product that
will improve efficiency and save your company money
in the process.

Area of Application
Sustainable growth through smarter separation
solutions
In many of the world’s most important industries,
separation is vital to sustainable growth. With the right
solution, food producers can continuously improve their
products while reducing waste. Cities can save energy
and conserve millions of cubic meters of water. Mining
companies can efficiently boost through out to meet
fast-changing global demands. And chemical
manufacturers can optimize for absolute product purity.
When it comes to the separation technologies and
services that maximize the value of your most precious
resources, no one has broader capabilities than NMP.
 
NMP is the world’s leading separation specialist, with
the deepest knowledge, broadest technical resources,
and most comprehensive service solutions. For more
than 42 years, we have helped our customers respond
to the world’s environmental, energy – resource,
health, and nutrition challenges by leveraging our
extensive knowledge to create, develop, implement,
and service innovative separation solutions. By solving
these fundamental challenges, we create lasting value
and drive growth across every industry we serve.

Improved Uptime, Efficiency and Costs

The driest cake – minimizes handling and processing
costs.
The clearest liquid effluent – suitable for reuse,
improves water conservation.
Reliable performance and very high uptime – reduces
operating costs.
Durable robust design and construction – minimizes
maintenance costs.
 
As filter press manufacturers, our products have wide
application in various industry sectors. The major
sectors we cater to are:

Waste Water Treatment plants 

Our filter presses find application in effluent treatments
plans, municipal sewage works, industrial purification
plants and industrial acid waste neutralisation.
Chemical Industries
Efficient and effective filtration is required in the
chemical industry. Filter presses are used as part of the
production process to filter pigments, dyes, catalysts,
detergents, bio-fuels and other intermediate products.

Sewage Treatment Plants

Our water treatment systems are used to control waste
water from industries, sewage odour control, BOD
reduction, aeration, clarification and nitrogen removal.
Effluent Treatment Plants
In effluent treatment plants, automatic and fully
automatic presses are used for liquid and chemical
waste, soil decontamination, liquid electroplating waste
and special waste incineration plants.

Tannery Industries
The tannery sector uses a lot of chemicals to obtain the
end product. The chemicals are dissolved in water and
sludge is created. The filter presses reduces the
moisture content, volume and weight of the solid
residue.
Textile Industries
The water waste from the textile industry contains
contaminants such as dyes, surfactants and heavy
metals. With the use of a filter press, the problem of
sludge bed is eliminated and overflow is controlled.

Food Processing Industries

Filter presses are used to filter and purify finished
products such as sugar, wine, beer, yeast for baking and
brewing and pectin.
Iron Ore
Filter presses in the iron ore industry are used for
mechanical dewatering of finest grain suspensions. It is
used for filtration of slurries.

Mines & Minerals

In the mine & mineral industry, filtration process is
carried out on coal, gravel quarries, ore extraction, lead,
copper, zinc, tin, manganese, metal and other non-
ferrous metals. It is also used on liquid electroplating
waste and washer water from blast furnaces.
Ceramic
Ceramic slurry filtration is one of the long-term
applications of filter presses. Nowadays the filter press
is used mainly for the filtration of sludge from porcelain
stoneware production purification plants. It is used to
filter clay, quartz, iron oxides, and inorganic pigments.

Pharmaceutical Industries
Filter presses are commonly used in the pharmaceutical
and biotechnology industry. It is mainly used to filter
agar-agar, blood plasma, algae and other various
intermediate pharmaceuticals.
Edible oil industries
Filter press machines and refinery machines are used as
oil purifiers in the edible oil processing industry. It is
used to refine rice bran oil, coconut oil, sunflower oil,
sesame oil, mustard oil, gingelly oil, and peanut oil.

Future developments
There are a number of developments in various
industries regarding the future of automatic horizontal-
type filter presses. During a filtration process with a
conventional horizontal-type filter press, the chambers
of the filter press cannot always be the same in terms of
the degree of cake formation, due to various, possible
inequalities. The imbalances among filter cakes formed
in the filter chambers cause appreciable recessed-plate
deformation, and sometimes lead to plate brakeage.
The recessed-plates for conventional filter presses are
provided with bosses (see Figure 6), which have been
believed to only give extra support during press closing
and are not essential. The author believes that the stay
bosses are the result of accumulated experiences by
developers for avoiding plate destruction. For filter
presses with compression devices, plate destruction
never occurs and the bosses are not needed.
Fully automatic horizontal-type filter presses equipped
with diaphragm compression devices have increased
their fields of application and now include sewage
sludge treatment. Figure 7 shows field test results on
filtering thickened sludge of 0.54% solids from deep-
well water works using two kinds of filters — a
conventional recessed-plate filter press with a chamber
thickness of 8.5mm, and a fully automatic filter press
with diaphragm compression and a chamber thickness
of 30mm. The thickness of 8.5mm for the conventional
type was selected on the basis of one batch operation
per day. Pressures for filtration and compression are
both 0.69MPa to yield 75% moisture cakes.
The moisture decrease in formed cakes for the non-
compression type proceeds very slowly through
filtration-consolidation phenomena due to the slow
changes in liquid flow patterns in cakes, after the
chambers are filled with normal filter cakes. However,
dewatering by diaphragm compression proceeds quite
rapidly as shown in the figure, and optimum operating
conditions can be easily established on the basis of
filtration-and-consolidation characteristics and the
downtime.
The filter press with the compression device treats half
the amount of sludge in less than a quarter of the time,
in other words the capacity is more than twice that of
the conventional filter press. Separated liquid is
recycled to the plant, and the dewatered sludge is used
on farmland or goes to landfill. For extremely high
degrees of dewatering, mainly for waterworks sludge,
an automatic filter press with diaphragm compression
and also with an electro-osmotic dehydrator device of
carbon electrodes was also developed in Japan.
However, the field of application may be limited to
sludge with only low electrical conductivity.
In order to meet the increasing demands for higher
degrees of deliquoring from difficult-to-filter materials,
attempts are being made to develop super-high
pressure filters. Recently, Kurita developed a high
pressure automatic horizontal-type filter press for oleic
fatty acid separation from palm oil. The filtration
pressure is 0.3MPa, and the compression pressure is as
high as 5.0MPa. The recessed-filter-plates are 1,500mm
× 1,500mm, with 176 chambers. For discharging cakes,
22 plates are opened at one time to have the same
50mm clearances between plates. The filter plates and
diaphragms are made in Germany. In view of the fact
that the pressures during filtration and compression
differ greatly, the hydraulic ram pressures actuated for
tightening the filter plates are regulated to be linearly
proportional to the operating pressures during filtration
and compression, to decrease excess loads on the filter.
The filters are now working successfully. The trend
towards increasing the pressure of automatic filter
presses may continue into the future, and international
collaboration for solving these worldwide difficulties
will be increasingly important.
In the modern filtration industry, market demands are
becoming increasingly elaborate and require finer and
higher degrees of separation, particularly for the
purposes of material recycling, energy cost saving, and
essential environmental protection. Recent
developments in various filters and separation
equipment, including automatic filter presses, will
continue to provide the technological tools for solving
these important problems.

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application-of-filter-presses-in-the-mining-industry/

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