Pneumatic conveying of powdered additive for glass bottle production

For this customer of ours, who specialises in the production of objects, including bottles, made of glass, we designed and built a compressed air propulsion system.

The material to be transported is an additive in powder form, to be fed into a special oven for the production of sparkling wine bottles, in quantities of 80/100 kg/h.

The compressed air machine is connected to a launcher maintained at a constant pressure of 6/8 bar.
The route that the powder has to take to enter the oven is 45 metres horizontally and 13 metres vertically.

Under system indication, a valve opens from the launcher and allows the product to flow along the grey tube.

The grey pipe that transports the product from the launching pear to its destination, is associated in parallel with a blue pipe: the latter has a smaller section and is directly connected to the compressor. In addition, every two metres, it has a regulating valve and a pressure gauge to allow a “cut-off” of compressed air.

But what does it do?

By regulating the pressure with the pressure gauge so that it remains stable and regular throughout the line, product stoppages are avoided: in fact, in the vicinity of the pressure drops there is a return of compressed air that ensures the cleaning of the line in all its sections and the continuity of product flow.