Item

Transportation of raw materials Application process

for input into kiln Raw material process

For a kiln with preheater, such as SP or NSP, mixed raw materials are transported to the
top of the preheater and then fed into the system. When the SP kiln was developed, air
Background compression transpotation by a Quinion pump was initially adopted. Because of great
pressure loss, high power consumption rate, and frequent compressor faults, however, a
more reliable and efficient method was expected.

Compressed air transportation was replaced with mechanical transportation such as a

combination of bucket elevator (BE) and air slider (AS).
Two or three Bes are installed up to the top of the preheater. Raw materials are lifted to
the top by changing the Bes and fed into the preheater through the AS.
BE has small no-load power because of its structure and AS is a means of transportation
using the self weight of powder. Therefore, this method can reduce power consumption
greatly compared with air compression delivery.
Air compression transportation used to cause great fan power loss because of large
volume of compressed air flowing into the system with raw materials. Mechanical
transportation can minimize the air inflow.
The initial BE used a short-link chain that caused many problems of abrasion or
elongation. A plate-type chain reduced these problems greatly and achieved the current
high reliability.

As of 1996, 72 systems use mechanical transportation and two systems use air
compression transportation in Japan.

Combination of BE and AS Guided-discharge Preheater

Descriptions bucket elevator

Dust
collector

Air slider

Blower
Powder

To kiln

Mechanical transportation reduced power consumption by even 80%, although depending

Results
on the distance of transportation.

Cost Bucket elevator (2 units): About 1.4 million US$ [1US$=¥110]

estimation (For a kiln having a capacity of 3000 t/d)

Related
matters

Reference

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