Mixing is possible
Spring is here. Homes and gardens call out for a sprucing-up. Continue reading
Lawns need to be mown, plants and flowers seen to and patios given a good scrubbing; and that wall outside and the living room could really do with a new coat of paint. Thanks to the corona crisis, we have time to deal with these things. A quick trip to the hardware store for a bucket of paint, and you have a piece of Kuhn Special Steel in your hand.
Stirring quality
What does a bucket of emulsion actually consist of? Well, first of all, there’s water. Then there’s a binder, to make the paint stick to the wall, along with a dispersing agent designed to ensure a good mixture, and of course various fillers and pigments. White is the basic pigment, followed by another agent to supply the desired colour shade. These pigments are finely ground microscopic particles, produced in ball mills and agitating grinders, which are considered to be the best solution for difficult-to-grind substances. The grinding balls first crush the suspended solids, such as titanium dioxide (the key white pigment). The ground pigments are then thoroughly mixed with the other ingredients to create an emulsion. We can see how the rotor/stator systems involved run at extremely high turning and grinding speeds to ensure maximum dispersion of the ultra-fine particles. One further advantage is that the mixture is highly stable, which means that neither pigments nor other substances (such as binding agents) can separate out – an important factor in the quality of an emulsion paint.
Stress-testing of rotors
The high turning and grinding speeds of the rotors and stators subject them to permanent stress. But this is no problem, as the processing units in question are supplied by Kuhn Special Steel. The high material quality of our centrifugally cast components ensures that ball grinding mills and dispersion machines run more efficiently, with less need for maintenance, which translates into less downtime.
So, as we were saying, with summer on the doorstep, we can use our “corona time” to give our home a makeover and get those walls painted!
Photos: © Ingo Bartussek – stock.adobe.com, Kuhn Edelstahl