Along with the time and expense you’ll save using a Packet System, you’ll also increase the efficiency of your wide-face machines. Here’s how:

1. The Packet System can be used on any brush we manufacture: abrasive, non-abrasive, and multi-filament bristle brushes.
2. Because the Packet System comes with so many bristle options, you’re able to change to a different abrasive grit size (i.e grit 80 to 240), or non-abrasive bristle trim length (i.e. for heavier cleaning), even in the middle of a job. Alternate the packets at different points to tailor the brush according to the demands of the job. ​

This would never have been possible in the past, but with the versatility of segments in the packet system, we’re able to be more agile. You get better tools, and you’re able to use them to get the job done faster.

SEE IT WORK.

Let's talk about dimples that turn our strip to scrap when debris is picked up during the Galvanizing, Gavalume, and Galvanneal process. After strip leaves the galvanizing pot, it usually goes through a long vertical climb for 8-10 stories. This gives the coating time to cool. The strip continues to travel down the line to through the “APC” (“After Pot Cooling”) and over a deflector roll. Many times a line has two deflator rolls: one for the pass up; one for the pass down.

And here’s where the problem comes in. 

Often, as in almost always, zinc particles get stuck in the coating and dry during the climb up. These little pieces of debris break off as they move through the APC turn and deflector rolls. They get stuck on the surface of the rolls and create dimples in the strip, which becomes a pattern of dimples as the strip continues to pass over.

Manufacturers have tried to address this problem with Kevlar® sleeves, blankets, and scrapers, but we all know debris still gets stuck and ruins huge amounts of strip, costing us time, money, and productivity. These “solutions” aren’t reliable, and they’re cost and maintenance intensive.

​APT offers a different solution. 

We know the best way to keep the surface of the rolls free from debris is to continually clean it. The best way to clean it is with a wide face brush. So, we’ve engineered a system that uses oscillating bristle brushes to continually clean the surface of the deflector roll. Take a look at the picture. APT designed this brush to sit close to the roll and can continually clean the surface.

• The oscillation speed varies between 50-80 strokes a minute, so you can program it specific to the job.
• We can fit the system with profile brushes so it works with rolls that have a crown.
• The brush can be configured using the packet system, making changes and replacements easy and cost effective. 
• The result is uniformed brush cleaning over the whole service of the roll so you know debris won’t turn your strip to scrap.

​Watch the video to see it in action:

Atlantech Process Technology designs and builds machines that give our clients a competitive edge in today’s challenging market. We engineer brushes and machines that clean the surface of rolls, strip, and sheet so you get a high-quality finished product every time. You can trust our experience and expertise to provide creative, effective solutions that raise the profit and productivity of your line. 

Our machines use propriety technology to optimize the mechanical surface-cleaning process, and our abrasive and non-abrasive bristle and non-woven brushes are some of the best brushes available to remove iron fines, residual oil, and zinc particles.

Ready for solutions?

Call David Thiemann at 816-382-9150 or email [email protected].

APT actually has figured out a way to prevent the shaft of your brush from being crushed, but many shops still extract the old way, which puts them at risk for bending the shaft or damaging the bearing blocks and/or journal ends.
​
The brush extraction process developed years ago uses a crane to lower the brush into place. But you can see from this video that when the crane removes its support, 5000 pounds of weight are placed on only 5" of the shaft!

That’s too much pressure. So the shaft bends, and you have issues with the bearings, seals, and journal.

Now many people have gotten really good at repairing this, but there’s no way to get back the time and resources it takes to fix the problem. The best thing to do is AVOID the problem in the first place. And that’s where Atlantech Process can help.

At APT, our first priority is improving your brush machine processes. We want to optimize your line so your customers are happy and your competition is not. 

Our brush-change process lets your replace a wide-face, 2-ton brushin under 15 minutes. You need only one person to do it AND there's no risk of bending the shaft.
Look at this vidoe to see what I'm talking about. Remember when it used to take almost the whole day and two people to change a brush of this size? Not anymore ....

Advancements in design and material have really changed the game. And we want you to  get the benefits of APT’s innovative brushes and machines. 

We’ll even show you how to save money on buying, using, and disposing of chemicals so you can afford a new brush machine. Imagine how your productivity and outcomes will improve with a new machine!

Stop wasting time with frequent and repetitive maintenance work that is holding you back.

Ready for solutions?

Call David Thiemann at 816-382-9150 or email [email protected].

 We can't stress enough the importance of correct calibration. Incorrect calibration is the cause of an extraordinary loss of time and money. It's essential to adjust your machine for the job. We can find the sweet spot of the brush on the sheet when we calculate the kW measurement at three or more different points in the load: ​

• no load
• point of friction
• at points with varying amounts of compression

If you're not sure how to the calculate the kW measurements at these three points, download the instructions.

In order for non-woven brushes to clean the surface of your strip correctly, they have to maintain their cylindrical shape. The trouble is, the pressure in the machine is often calibrated wrong, which crushes the brush bristles, changing their shape. Under a high load, non-woven brushes quickly change shape and mass.

To avoid this, and to reduce 70% of your brush problems, adjust the pressure in your machine regularly.

Inaccurate calibration causes non-woven brushes to wear out unevenly and prematurely. That leaves nasty prints on the metal—which means more frustration for us.

The good news is you don't need to fix the machine. 

Instead, recaliprate the machine to give you the results you want. Load pressure gives you  total control over the outcome. 

Maybe you’ve never been trained on how, why, and when to calibrate non-woven scrub brushes. (Or maybe you know how and why to calibrate, but you’re not sure when.) 

With over 50 years experience building brushes and scrubber machines, APT can help. We’ll troubleshoot with you to determine why your “machine isn’t working," plus, we'll provide technical training resources and calibration sheets so you can put your machine maintenance on a proper care schedule and get the reliable performance you expect.
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Stop losing time, money, and patience. Contact APT today.

And that brings us back to our scrubber brush machines. The brush tracks reveal our contact points (friction) with the metal strip surface. But before we get too far, let me tell you one thing: there’s a difference here with non-woven brushes and bristle brushes.

• Non-woven brushes - If you increase the force of the brush on the strip, the brush is able to aggressively scrub the srip. However, while max pressure allows for the max cleaning ability of the brush, it also wears out the brush much quicker than needed.
• With bristle brushes the opposite is true. The max compression on a bristle brush is 3mm into the strip. Any more than that and the cleaning ability decreases and the life of the brush decreases drastically as well. If you go over 3mm of compression of a bristle brush, you are prematurely destroying your brush. The tip of the bristle is the abrasive, so to get the best results, back off before you increase. ​

When we increase the pressure on a non-woven brush, we increase the nip/footprint. This is the “tire track” we were talking about. The “nip” is the area where abrasive scrubber brushes and rolls make contact with a flat surface. When we increase the nip, more abrasive material covers a greater amount of surface.

You can analyze the track marks of a brush by using this diagram. This helps give you an idea of whether the adjustments need to be made to the brush or not.

   Notice the four rows all show scrubber brushes with the same diameter. What changes between rows is the amount of compression. The first row shows the abrasive scrubber brushes at 0mm of compression, the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th show the compression from 1mm, 2mm, and 3mm of compression. 

    We’ve already talked about increasing the footprint of a scrubber brush by increasing the brush’s pressure on the strip—but this can also increase the wear of industrial scrubber brushes as they’re cleaning and finishing flat metal strip. (Read more here.) Every machine has a max point of compression where the abrasive scrubber brush performs best against the metal strip and sheet. Beyond that point, wide-face bristle scrubber brushes lose their ability to clean. The filament is crushed against the metal, so the abrasive scrubber brush tips cannot glide along the surface of the metal to get it clean it. Adding pressure at this point destroys industrial brushes. A safe rule of thumb is somewhere around 3-5mm of compression. Make sure you have measurement scales installed on all your scrubber brush machines so you know the accurate amount of compression. Learn how here.

    Beyond finding the ideal compression point, you can also increase the footprint by increasing the diameter of the abrasive scrubber brush. Makes sense, right? Bigger brush, bigger footprint. 

Let’s do some Calculations
    By increasing your abrasive scrubber brush diameter from 12” to14,” the brush footprint increases by 8%. When an industrial brush diameter expands from 8” to 12,” the brush footprint improves by 22%. In general, we can estimate an increase in an abrasive scrubber brush diameter by 2” will yield a 10% increase in footprint. APT builds scrubber brush machines that can hold 16,” 18,” and even 20” diameter industrial brushes, which can really improve the speed of the line. We even have brush-on-brush machines. 

    What does all this mean? A “footprint” is the amount of contact area the abrasive scrubber brush has with the strip, sheet, or workpiece. The larger the footprint, the more friction and cleaning is done on the strip. Often the the cleaning section is the bottleneck in your line, so by increasing your scrubber brush diameter by only 2”, you could feasibly increase your line speed by 10%. Now, there are some qualifiers: you have to make sure the dwell time in all your chemical tanks is long enough, and a few other things, but conceptually you understand the improvement a larger diameter on your abrasive scrubber brush can make. Here’s the point: you can increase the speed and your machine’s ability to clean mechanically simply by increasing the diameter of the brush. 

Adjusting for Space.
    If you are considering upgrading your scrubber brush machine but have a fixed amount of space, APT can build machines to accommodate abrasive scrubber brushes with larger diameters that don’t require more foot space. We can also show you a brush-on-brush system. In the same space you currently operate a 4-head system, for example, we can place an 8-head system—doubling the speed using the same amount of space. 

    We are also working on projects where we can shorten the chemical section and increase the mechanical cleaning using abrasive scrubber brushes, which is environmentally responsible, but it also provides a way to make the best use of space! That’s a topic for a different series when we discuss chemical vs. mechanical cleaning.

    For now, I wanted to hit home the concept that if you increase your brush diameter, you increase your ability to clean more metal strip in a faster time—and you get cleaner strip.
​
    To talk with us about the possibility of increasing the diameter of the abrasive scrubber brushes in your scrubber brush machines, give us a call at 816-382-9150. We would love to talk to you about ways you could increase the speed of your line.