Thickeners
Waterex has been designing and engineering thickeners since 1965 for a range of industrial and mining applications. Waterex's designs are backed by our own laboratory capability and pilot thickener plant allowing Waterex to continually develop state of the art technologies for specific applications.
Waterex offers conventional thickeners, Hirate thickeners, Ultra Hirate thickeners and Paste thickeners. Thickener diameters up to 35m are available with the rake mechanism supported off the bridge by structural steel at the tank walls. Waterex design thickener tanks and walls for upset conditions where the tank is filled with a density of between 15% and 45% solids above the normal underflow concentration as demanded by the application.
Thickener Types
Conventional thickeners can be operated with or without flocculation depending on the application and are traditionally easier to operate due to their relatively slow settling rates.
Waterex Hirate thickeners are designed to disperse flocculant efficiently into the settling zone of the thickener. The feed system is carefully designed in order to achieve this efficient flocculation. Increased flocculation efficiency is employed with a higher settling rate than conventional units resulting in a reduced surface area.
Waterex Ultra Hirate thickeners operating in counterflow are capable of producing an underflow with maximum solids concentration. These units have a smaller diameter than Hirate thickeners but rely on higher side walls for maximum underflow density.
Applications
Waterex uses thickeners to provide solutions for many applications including:
- Paste thickening
- Pregnant liquor recovery
- Process leaching
- Scrubber water from FGD plants
- Tailings treatment
- Thickening of activated sludge
