The performance of continuous centrifugals on high grade massecuite
By Greig, CR; Greig, RR; Abernethy, PE; Reid, AW
The 1994 season was the first in the Australian sugar industry where
certain factories became reliant on continuous centrifugals for a substantial proportion
of their shipment sugar production. This has allowed the accumulation
of considerable performance data measured during routine production of a range
of sugar qualities from JA to direct consumption quality and including white
refined sugar. This paper reports on comparisons between the performance of
batch and continuous centrifugals, with particular emphasis on sugar and
molasses purity results at various rates and sugar polarisation standards. Raw
sugar machines have been successfully applied to production of all types of
sugar (JA to XHP) on both A and B massecuite. However, the production of
XHP sugar from lower purity B massecuites or those having a high proportion
of fines is difficult. Different washing mechanisms exist for continuous and
batch machines. As a result, it is difficult to dissolve sugar in the continuous
machine. Dissolution, while not desirable, is essential for certain applications
such as producing sugar of 99.4 pol from massecuites of less than 85 pol and
white sugar from beet massecuites. Also, if the massecuite contains a high proportion
of fine crystals, the capacity to produce higher pol sugars is reduced.
Options to provide for dissolution are outlined. Brief mention is made of crystal
quality and power consumption.