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HONDA RACING CLEANS UP WITH GUYSON
Co-solvent unit chosen for precision cleaning of aluminium and titanium F1 engine components
In the highly competitive and technologically advanced world of Formula One motor racing, engine component cleanliness is taken very seriously. So when specifying a new cleaning system for a range of aluminium and titanium F1 engine racing components, Honda Racing Developments chose a Kerry Microsolve Co-solvent unit to meet their very exacting requirements.
Guyson International, manufacturers of the Kerry branded range of ultrasonic cleaning equipment, installed and commissioned into the Honda Racing Developments (now Mercedes GP) UK site one of its largest Kerry Microsolve Co-solvent cleaning systems for the precision cleaning of F1 engine blocks and other racing components.
The precision cleaning equipment is a four stage operational unit working with two ultrasonic tanks, vapour rinsing and freeboard drying. Components are held in wire baskets and precisely delivered to each stage via an unmanned automated work transporter.
The Kerry Microsolve co-solvent four-stage cleaning machine has two ultrasonic, heated cleaning stages equipped with continuous filtration. In the first stage a boiling mixture of HFE (hydrofluoroether) solvent and a hydrocarbon solvating agent removes gross contamination from the machined components. Large quantities of soils and general contamination can be taken up by the solvating agent, making the process particularly suitable for high volume cleaning with minimal tank maintenance.
In the second stage pure HFE solvent removes any residues from the components carried over from the first cleaning tank. Both tanks are equipped with an optimum series of ultrasonic transducers attached to the underside base of the tanks, each separate tank’s transducers being powered by three P500 module generators with automatic tuning, operating at 38 kHz. Both tanks are also fitted with electric heating with electronic temperature controls and digital indication.
Component rinsing then takes place in the vapour generated from the boiling mixture in the area above the immersion tanks. Drying takes place in the ‘freeboard’ refrigerated zone above the vapour level. This highly effective reflux cooling system, vapour break and a deep freeboard zone all help to minimise expensive solvent loss by acting as an invisible cold barrier where the hot HFE vapour rising to the freeboard area condenses onto refrigerated condensing coils and is fed back into the stage 2 tank as pure HFE. This in turn forces dissolved residues in stage 2 to flow back to the stage 1 tank.
An ‘Autotrans Mk4 Major’ work transfer system ensures consistent, repeatable quality whilst increasing throughput, and also contributes to cost reductions by controlling the speed of component basket movement through the vapour zone, thus reducing solvent drag-out caused by disturbance of the vapour blanket. The Autotrans is integrated with two metre long powered feed and exit conveyors for fully automatic operation and has a load capacity of up to 80 kg per stainless steel basket.
The whole precision cleaning unit is controlled by a hand-held touch-sensitive programming keyboard which can hold a variety of password protected pre-programmed cleaning sequences that can include customised dwell times, transfer speeds, immersion times etc.
Free cleaning trials
Guyson International Ltd offer demonstrations and free cleaning trials at their sales, production and demonstration site in Skipton, North Yorkshire. To contact Guyson International, please call +44 (0)1756 799911 or email info@guyson.co.uk.
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