"Distillation Tailor Made"
With an innovative solution again the distillation experts of ILUDEST were able to solve a very ambitious customer demand by putting into practice: optimized separation of crude oil into high temperature fractions, a process which cannot be effected by using one of the common ASTM-standards e.g. acc. to D2892 or D5236.
ASTM D2892 allows to fractionate crude oil samples by using a packed column (approx. 15 theoretical plates) up to approx. 400°CAET (2 mmHg).
The pursuing standard ASTM D5236 allows to fractionate crude oil samples up to approx. 540…565°CAET (0.1 mmHg), however, by using an open-tube column (approx. 2 theoretical plates). Hence, the overlapping range of fractions (= parameter for the separating quality) is huge, approx. 15…25°C and more. A customer in South Korea, served by ILUDEST with a comprehensive range of ASTM-units of different standards and sizes since many years, approached us with a demand far beyond the capabilities of those ASTM-standards. Thus the team of ILUDEST developed, designed and produced a distillation plant characterized by an "unusual" combination of parameters as follows:
- high separation efficiency (25…30 theoretical plates) even under vacuum condition
- low overlapping ranges (< 10°C)
- fractions up to 600°CAET (thus beyond ASTM D2892/D5236)
- operation pressure atm…0.001 mmHg (thus the actual vacuum is about 100 times lower than requested by ASTM D5236)
- high distillation rates even at very low vacuum, thus the common ASTM-distillation times are not exceeded
- large charges up to 200 ltr, which do allow the production of well defined fractions for developing new products.
Other R&D projects of ILUDEST currently in progress:
- fully automated online version of the analyzer acc. to ASTM D1160
- fully automated product sampling system out of oil tanks acc. to ASTM D4057 (no draining of tanks or modifying tank internals are required for installing the device)
