- Title
- Manufacturing of continuous flow equipment
- Creator
- Strydom, Martin
- Subject
- Microfluidics
- Subject
- Nanofluids Micro-reactor
- Date Issued
- 2018
- Date
- 2018
- Type
- Thesis
- Type
- Masters
- Type
- MSc
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/10948/35818
- Identifier
- vital:33850
- Description
- For the work of this thesis a proof of concept microreactor and pump have been designed. Open source technology was used where possible to reduce the manufacturing cost. The pump is a pseudo HPLC/Syringe pump hybrid which adopts designs from both pumping systems. It works by charging two volumes of liquid into the primary chamber while the secondary chamber discharges. When the charge of the primary chamber is complete half of the liquid is pumped into the secondary chamber and the other half gets discharged. This has the benefit of sharing a common drive to reduce cost. The pump did function; however, the 3D printed parts did not have sufficient rigidity to offset mechanical stress, thus flexing occurred. The micro-reactor that was developed, was unique to commercial units. It was not chemically or thermally bonded but clamped with a gasket sealing the channels. This provides the advantage of unblocking inert material in the reactor. The reactor disk that was clamped was a super alloy, namely, Hastelloy C276. The reactor was tested against two commonly used reactors, namely, Chemtrix3227 and Little Things Factory (MS+VS). A simple synthesis of ethyl acetate has been used as a model reaction for comparing. The test reactor did not perform as well as the commercial counterparts, however probable causes have been identified for potential future work. Both the pump and the reactor worked as a proof of concept system, however further development is required for commercialisation.
- Format
- 178 leaves
- Format
- Publisher
- Nelson Mandela University
- Publisher
- Faculty of Science
- Language
- English
- Rights
- Nelson Mandela University
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NMU School of BioMolecular and Chemical Sciences
| Thumbnail | File | Description | Size | Format | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| View Details Download | SOURCE1 | Martin Strydom.pdf | 5 MB | Adobe Acrobat PDF | View Details Download |