Industrial screeners increase production efficiency for pharma manufacturers

Published: 23-Feb-2017

Russell Finex vibratory screening machines and separators for powder separation, friction free wires and mesh blocking prevention

A crucial step in processing pharmaceutical products is to select the right sieving equipment to remove agglomerates, oversize particles or contaminants from incoming raw dry materials.

Russell Finex vibratory screening machines and separators first use vibratory sieves screen incoming ingredients to remove any lumps that may have formed during transportation.

Several Russell gyratory separators are used at a later stage to separate powders into different particle sizes before further processing and remove any agglomerated particles after final product coating.

The design offers quick disassembly for cleaning between batches, enabling pharmaceutical products to be consistently controlled and produced according to quality standards.

The plant also utilises the Finex Separator to remove agglomerated particles that form during processing. The high capacity vibrating separator is suitable for sizing, check-screening and grading a variety of pharmaceutical powders and granules.

In one pass, materials can be screened to remove oversize contamination or separated into five different fractions to ensure that the final product meets precise specification.

The unit is designed to keep maintenance to a minimum and is available in a high quality 316L grade stainless steel finish.

High containment check-screening

For many years, occupational exposure limits (OELs) and personal protective equipment (PPE) have safeguarded employees’ health when handling pharmaceutical formulations which contain high levels of potent active pharmaceutical ingredients (API’s).

Russell Finex manufactures a range of fully-contained powder sieving equipment which further protects operator exposure to hazardous airborne dust particles.

The Russell Compact Airlock Sieve is certified to OEL level 5. The sanitary sieve uses a pneumatic airlock clamping system to contain toxic dust. The patented Twist, Lock, Inflate (TLI) technology provides a uniform, dust-tight seal to safeguard against powder leakage.

Process efficiency

One of the largest GSK manufacturing facilities in the UK use industrial pharmaceutical sieves fitted with the Vibrasonic Deblinding System from Russell Finex.

The sanitary vibratory sifters are used at the final stage of primary manufacture, to screen pharmaceutical powders to the required size before they are sent away to the second manufacturing stage – where the powders are made into tablets or liquid suspensions.

Pharmaceutical manufacturers use the Russell Vibrasonic Deblinding System to prevent mesh screen blinding or blocking. The system applies an ultrasonic frequency to the mesh screen to breakdown surface tension.

This makes the screen wires friction-free, therefore preventing particles that are slightly greater and smaller than the mesh apertures from blinding or blocking the screen.

Some of the pharmaceutical powders produced at the GSK plant are static and of a low density, making them difficult to screen efficiently because of mesh blinding. This ultimately slows down production and reduces screening efficiency.

Following the installation of the Russell Vibrasonic Deblinding System, GSK has solved the mesh blinding problems, adhering to the FDA and due diligence requirements.

You may also like