THE BEAUTY OF BOILING

A Partial Assessment of Pan Automation

A Brief Report by Susan M. Flores, presented to the Factory Staff of HPCO
July 25, 2009

Objectives:
To update ourselves of Whats new in the Boiling House To orient ourselves briefly about the Boiling Automation To know the possible effect or advantages of this Automation

Introduction:
There is a call for every manufacturing firm to advance its system to attain high or optimum efficiency to produce its product within or less cost of production without compromising its standard. The worlds trends today in all aspects are now on computers and automation, its relevance to the system and how it affects the lives of the people. It could be in schools (education), home, institutions, workplace and others. In Sugar Industry there is a competition per se in the product and how it manufactured according to the worlds acceptability. The need to be affiliated in Global manner lead us to have all the necessary requirements like HACCP, ISO accreditations and automation on process system which we believe plays a vital role to be IN in todays standard. And these we are working towards and looking forward to. Process Automation is to be regarded as an important part of modern factory management and organization. Since Vacuum Pan Control is said to be ---- perhaps the most difficult unit operation to understand and control, (according to Mr.Chung Chi Chou of Cane Sugar Handbook 12th ed.,), more sugar centrals are leading or indulging into automation which is now become a necessity to have a more effective, efficient and safe way in producing white sugar. This report is the partial assessment of Pan Automation in the Boiling House Department of Hawaiian-Philippine Company, which commenced only on the latter part of our Milling Season (CY 2008-2009) and it took only 49 days of commissioning period. The supposed Assessment which should considerably covers at least one (1) whole Milling would have given us substantial (gathering of) data and analyses for a more rigid, dependable and reliable evaluation for establishing a standard parameters of Pan Boiling Automation. Eycon HMI unit was installed and tested last March 9, 2009 to Vacuum Pan # 1, # 2, # 8 and # 9 with the following corresponding boiling of special seed graining, B-masse and A-masse (for 8 # 9) respectively. The Commissioning Consultant was Mr. Eddie Sheppard of CONUTROL Instrument Services and the in-house personnel assigned were Mr. Ian Deloso of Instrumentation and myself as a Process Supervisor .

Features of HMI (Human Machine Interface) unit:

Pre-Set Profile
Finish Level Charge Level Seeding RF Footing RF Main RF Active RF SP

Features of HMI (Human Machine Interface) unit:

Pre-Set Profile

% RF to % Pan Level Profile

Each Pan Boiling has an estimated established RF increment according to Pan Level (depending on the target brix of Finished massecuite/strike).

Chart Logging Profile

Sample Chart of Manually-Operated Boiling

Sample Chart of Pan # 1

Sample Chart of Pan # 2

Sample Chart of Pan # 9

Sample Chart of Pan # 8 (Non-cleaning of Magma)

Example of Vacuum Loss Reflected on the Chart Logging

On Vacuum & Steam control

-

Any sudden increase in vacuum or any sudden fall in steam pressure causes a risk of forming secondary grains, due to the reduction in boiling temperature in the pan. from p. 682 of Handbook of Cane Sugar Engineering by E. Hugot, 2nd. Ed.

GATHERING OF DATA , ANALYSES & COMPUTATIONS:

1. Laboratory Analyses: i. Microscopic Crystal Size Analysis for Massecuites - A strike sample is analyzed using a microscope to measure actual sizes of all grains randomly. Four (4) shots in every angle of a sample were executed for a well representative analysis. Each crystal is measured in mm and recorded for the computation of Coefficient of Variation.

Boiling of Special C-seed (Pan # 1)

Boiling of B-masse (Pan # 2)

% C.V. = 26.05 % G.S. = 68.86

Boiling of A-masse (Pan # 8)

2. Computations:
i. For Massecuite and BD/SRS Sugar
-

A good measure of grain uniformity which is also termed as Coefficient of Variability as what John G. Ziegler called is mostly considered to be effective in comparing sugar quality with regards to size variation.

Working Equation:
From Perrys Chemical Engineers Handbook, 6th ed., eq. (19-11), p. 9-29; % C.v. 100 ( PD16 % - PD84 %) 2 PD50 % Where: Cv PD = = coefficient of variation, as a percentage particle diameter from intercept on ordinate axis At percent indicated (based on the cumulative percent on the log-probability scale)

Example Computation for % C.V. from microscopic pictures:

Another statistical standard of computation for Coefficient of Variation (% c.v.) is also applied as comparative analysis since it represents population and categorizing the desired Particle Diameter (PD) of the crystal size. Working Equation: % c.v. = standard deviation x 100 Mean

= measures the relative dispersion of crystals in terms of sizes.

ii. Grain Size Analysis for BD / SRS Sugar

A sugar sample is taken after Drying and test using the Tyler Mesh Sieve with Mesh No. 10, 14, 20, 28 and 35. Percent Retained for every Sieve is weighed and reported as % Retained by Weight for every Mesh Sieve.
Example G.S. Analysis of Strike #2480-8 Tyler Mesh # Retained on 10 Retained on 14 Retained on 20 Retained on 28 Retained 0n 35 Passed thru 35 Nom. Opening 1.651 mm 1.168 0.833 0.589 0.417 % Retained 0.11 0.89 24.32 47.08 25.50 2.10

Note: Good operation of a good pan will produce sugar, as boiled, with C.v. in the low 20s which is excellent, below 30 as well operated, a C.v. of 40 represents inferior work and higher values indicate very poor sugar.

Effect on Automation:
1.Comparative Results for BD / SRS - Sugar - using Grain Size Analysis on Tyler Mesh Retained at # 20 & 28
(0.833 and 0.589 mm) average size (or mean) VP #6 7 8 9 10 Before 62.69 mm 61.55 60.69 58.64 62.15 On/After 72.98 74.37 71.47 70.74 69.66 diff. 10.29 12.82 10.78 12.10 7.51 % inc. 14.10 % 17.24 15.08 17.10 10.78

Average Grain Size of BD-SRS Sugar

100 90 80 70 % Retained @ Tyler 60 Mesh No. 20 & 28 50 40 30 20 10

Before Automation On Automation

10
Tyler Mesh Nominal Opening # 20 --------- 0.833 mm # 28 ---------- 0.589 mm

Vacuum Pan #

Stk #

% G.S Stk # Before

56.88 64.43 61.35 63.95 58.49 64.20 65.39 77.33 2784-9 2785-8 2797-8 2806-8 2802-8 2725-9 2816-9 2820-9

% G.S After
67.16 61.63 75.44 64.19 79.87 97.93 69.21 82.61

2773-9 2764-8 2772-8 2750-6 2760-8 2759-9 2756-8 2749-7

Modification of Magma Conditioning ( BDS/SRS-Masse)

% Retained @ Tyler Mesh #20 & 28 100 80 60 40 20 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Random Selection of Strikes
before after

Massecuite % C.v.
Seed/Strike Special C-seed B-masse A masse Ave. % C.v. 15 35 Boiling

Excellent to Good

30 38 .Good 20 35 ..Good

Advantages of Pan Automation

Increased Sugar Recovery Improved Sugar Quality Reduced Steam Use Increased Safety Reduced Operating Cost