The Solid-Liquid Extraction Unit "UESLB" is a laboratory-scale unit designed to study the separation of a soluble element from a solid in a continuous feed, multistage and countercurrent way, with the help of a solvent.
The unit utilises a rotary extractor system to study the separation of a soluble element in a solid (carrier material) in a continuous feed, multiple stage and countercurrent way with the help of a solvent. It can be also configured as an extraction of a stage and batch. The effects of stages numbers, extraction type, temperature, solvent flow, particle size and solvent type can be investigated.
The design of the unit is based on an extraction tank with eight continuous rotation extraction cells used in industrial scale, which is called "Rotocel". This is the main part of the solid/liquid extraction system. The raw material is fed into the cells from the feed hopper and is then passed under three solvent diffusers. The soluble component and the solvent can passed to other diffuser with a peristaltic pump, in other words, the product passes for several stages.
The solid carrier can be a light porous material (i.e. Desiccant aluminum oxide beads). It can be impregnated with a salt such as sodium bicarbonate or potassium bicarbonate, which is then extracted by the process.
The unit includes three heating elements (console controlled) to study of the influence of the temperature in the extraction process, two motors for the feed hopper operation and the extraction tank operation, three peristaltic pumps (console controlled) to impel the product.
Three temperature sensorsQ measure the temperature of the product in different points of the unit. ,