Interface
I shall let you all ponder for 24 hours before explaining what we have here .
Well it is over 24 hours and an explanation is required .
What you see is what is known as a " water separator " and it is indeed found on the back of a dry cleaning machine . In dry cleaning the solvent ( perchloroethylene ) is used over and over again and is constantly filtered plus it is distilled to remove all the muck and grunge ( and that is a messy job raking out the still !!! ) . In distilling the solvent is boiled and the vapour drawn off and condensed to recover the pure solvent , however there will be some water within the condense and perc and water do not mix and indeed you do not want excessive water in the cleaning process . Thus the condensed liquids flow back through the water separator with the solvent being the heavier liquid filling the bottom half and the water floating on the top of the solvent . The interface of the two liquids often has a build up of matter and this is what you are looking at here through a glass sight glass . As I no longer work in dry cleaning this shot was taken at a colleagues shop when I popped in for some haberdashery for my wife - and of course a natter .
As a note , environmental regulations dictate that for every litre of solvent used you will be expected to clean a minimum of 80 kilos of work !
Interface
I shall let you all ponder for 24 hours before explaining what we have here .
Well it is over 24 hours and an explanation is required .
What you see is what is known as a " water separator " and it is indeed found on the back of a dry cleaning machine . In dry cleaning the solvent ( perchloroethylene ) is used over and over again and is constantly filtered plus it is distilled to remove all the muck and grunge ( and that is a messy job raking out the still !!! ) . In distilling the solvent is boiled and the vapour drawn off and condensed to recover the pure solvent , however there will be some water within the condense and perc and water do not mix and indeed you do not want excessive water in the cleaning process . Thus the condensed liquids flow back through the water separator with the solvent being the heavier liquid filling the bottom half and the water floating on the top of the solvent . The interface of the two liquids often has a build up of matter and this is what you are looking at here through a glass sight glass . As I no longer work in dry cleaning this shot was taken at a colleagues shop when I popped in for some haberdashery for my wife - and of course a natter .
As a note , environmental regulations dictate that for every litre of solvent used you will be expected to clean a minimum of 80 kilos of work !