Spray drying nozzles

Engineering consideration 4 - Wear and tear

The downside of spraying at high pressures is that wear on the nozzle is high.  This is coupled with the fact that the fluid being sprayed is generally viscous or “lumpy”.  By the very nature of the process the fluid being sprayed is water with particles suspended in it.  This means that the suspended particles are being smashed into the nozzles at high pressure – inevitably this means they wear out quickly.

To counter the problem of rapid wear most spray dry nozzles will have tungsten carbide alloy swirl chambers but even this only slows the problem.  The modular nature of the nozzles helps keep down the cost of replacements, as if an orifice is worn then only that part needs be replaced rather than the whole assembly.

TD nozzles were originally designed to make replacement of parts easier and quicker.  With their patented locking mechanism  no specialist tools are required to quickly change over nozzles.  Whilst this feature does not directly help with the problem of wear, it does mean that the downtime and hassle experienced when nozzles do wear out is minimised.