Dave Howell, General Manager of DMN-WESTINGHOUSE, producer of rotary and diverter valves, explains how Multiport Tube Diverters ensure a higher ROI for dry bulk solids processors.
As longstanding producers of diverter and rotary valves, we often discuss valve performance with users in the field, whether they work with our valves or those of a competitor. One unhappy dry bulk solids processor referred to his diverters as a ‘necessary evil’. Understandable, perhaps, but also a bit harsh.
Diverter valves are crucial for the transport of raw material, but they can also cause a loss of product quality, a loss of factory real estate, and even a loss of line potential. We want to tell you what we told this unhappy processor: it does not have to be that way.
The Threat of Product Degradation
For many dry bulk solids processors, the physical state of their raw material is as critical as its chemical composition. Especially industries that handle friable solids – from specialised pharmaceutical granules and infant formula to ceramic catalysts and high-value polymers – struggle with retaining material integrity. They are fighting a fight with a silent thief of value: mechanical product degradation.
Every time a fragile material changes direction within a pneumatic conveying system, it is at risk. Traditional diverters often feature sharp bends that damage the raw material when transported at a high speed. The product disintegrates, with potentially disastrous results.
This is the cost of dust:
- Degradation of a valuable resource: When you reduce breakage of your valuable raw materials, you can use them fully; not 87%, not 92%, but up to 99%.
- Heightened risks of fire and explosions: Friables that crumble and break cause dust clouds (also known as fines). This increases the risk of fire and explosions – and that should really be your first reason to consider an alternative.
- Reduced system efficiency: Another disadvantage of excessive dust is that it can drive up backpressure and make your system less efficient.
- Inconsistent bulk density: Broken particles will pack more tightly, which can cause problems with volumetric dosing and batch weights down the line.
The Answer: Smooth Geometry
By replacing a series of diverter valves with a single multiport tube diverter, you already diminish the number of collision points in your installation. But if you choose a well-designed multiport, like DMN-WESTINGHOUSE’s M-TDV Multiport Tube Diverter, your flow becomes truly smooth.
The M-TDV is a multiport valve without sharp bends. Its design centres around ‘full bore’ architecture that features a swan neck: a continuous, curved internal pipe. This pipe automatically aligns with the desired outlet, so instead of a hard collision, the transported dry bulk solids experience a sliding transition.
Winning the Fight for Factory Real Estate
Diverter valves are big boys – but you know that already. They are so large that many dry bulk solids processors struggle with their legacy footprint: the surface taken up by their existing equipment. Manifolds and forests of piping can take up a lot of space, while moving or even expanding your facilities is never easy, if even feasible. Having insufficient room can hamper innovation and impede efficiency.
This is where a multiport valve can breathe new life into your facility. To illustrate this, consider the M-TDV. Say you want to replace five diverters that take up a surface of 4.31 m2 together (see Fig. 1 image for the setup[OB1] ). The single M-TDV that replaces them, has a footprint of 1.24 m2. This multiport frees up 3.06 m2, and the more diverters you replace, the more space you win.
Any producer will be happy with more space, but dry bulk solids processors with cleanrooms benefit especially. The high costs per m2 of a cleanroom makes for an even more convincing argument in favour of multiports.
Hygiene to the Highest Standard
Gone are the days of “clean enough”. Authorities issue ever stricter food safety protocols, while multi-ingredient recipes frequently feature allergens. This makes hygiene by design a matter of legal compliance and brand reputation for dry bulk solids processors. Traditional valves often feature dead zones: small pockets or crevices where material can build up, ferment, or cross-contaminate the next batch.
Circling back to the M-TDV, you will find that its design is a direct response to the increasingly strict food safety protocols. With its enclosed product path, the tube-to-tube design inherently eliminates these contamination pockets. The M-TDV even exceeds current requirements, making it a future-proof solution that is EC 1935/2004- and FDA-compliant, with ATEX 2014/34/EU-certified and USDA-accepted versions available.
The Business Case for a Multiport Tube Diverter
A multiport is a long-term investment. When evaluating its business case, your focus must shift from initial capital outlay to Total Cost of Ownership (TCO). The return on investment is found in a series of quantifiable areas. We already had a look at some advantages, including yield recovery by reducing product degradation; regaining factory real-estate due to the space-saving design of the multiport; and risk mitigation through hygienic design.
But a multiport diverter has more to offer:
- Less and simpler maintenance: replacing 10+ valves with a single unit means your maintenance team only has one set of actuators and one set of seals to monitor. This reduces your spare parts inventory, the repair mean time, and maintenance labour costs.
- More uptime: with fewer components to fail, your system is operational for a longer time, and thereby more productive. A diverter like the M-TDV is designed to ensure that changeovers between different products are significantly faster.
- Energy efficiency: a more direct and smoother product flow also means your solids encounter less overall resistance during transport, resulting in measurable savings in kWh.
A Future-proof Approach to Diverting Dry Bulk Solids
With dry bulk solid materials becoming more complex and safety standards getting increasingly strict, the equipment that routes these products must evolve as well. The multiport tube diverter represents this evolution at the crossroads of fluid dynamics, spatial efficiency and hygienic integrity. With a premium multiport diverter, engineers can ensure that the product leaving the facility is of the exact same quality as the product that entered the line. In the world of high-value processing, that consistency is the ultimate value proposition.
