The individual, and often replaceable, components of a blender are pretty basic and consist of the following:
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In a knee-bone-connected-to-the-shin-bone sort of way, here's how the parts work together. The base of the blender is the housing, which contains a high-speed, fan-cooled electric motor as well as the speed controls. The hefty weight of the housing keeps the blender on the counter during blending. In some models, the blade is permanently attached to the housing, but in most cases, the blade, gasket and jar base are all separate pieces that fit together and attach to the jar. The blade sits inside the gasket, which prevents leakage. These two parts fit snugly into the jar base, which screws onto the jar.
The assembled jar snaps onto a coupler, also known as a clutch or a serrated drive, depending on the manufacturer, which protrudes from the housing and attaches to the blade. The coupler connects to the motor, and this is the device that controls the movement and speed of the blender.
The lid forms an airtight seal on the jar -- prepare to wipe down your walls, counter and floor if you forget the lid on a full blender. The lid usually has a removable piece called a fill cap, which allows you to add ingredients without stopping the blender. In some models, this piece serves a dual purpose as a measuring cup.
The blades of a blender are constructed of stainless steel for durability and maximum sharpness. Most configurations consist of four blades arranged in multiple planes and set at different angles. This results in more contact between the food and the blades. The shape of the jar plays a part in the blender's efficiency, too -- tapered jars, the most effective shape, funnel food down into the blades.
To explain what happens to your food when you blend it, let's follow the path of a strawberry that you drop into the jar with other ingredients to create a delicious smoothie. You push a button to start the blender, and the motor begins to turn the blades. The circular whirring motion creates a vortex, defined as a spiral movement in a fluid. In the blender, the fluid includes both liquid ingredients and air. The vortex causes a vacuum at the center of the jar, which pulls the strawberry toward the middle, much like a tornado. Unlike a tornado, though, a blender jar contains the vortex.
As the strawberry combines with the other ingredients and begins to liquefy, the liquid follows the blade in a whirling motion around the container, forming a well near its center. The well in the center of a blender's vortex is shallow, so it displaces the blender's contents as they're drawn toward the axis at the center of the blade. The whirling motion and lack of space below the blades forces the liquefied strawberry up and out the sides. This circular pattern continues, whipping air into the contents, which helps mix the ingredients more quickly, until you stop the blender. The final result is a frothy strawberry smoothie with a homogenized blend of ingredients and a consistent texture.
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In our next section, we will talk about what makes one blender different from another and what to look for when shopping for one.
Getting back to our product focused Tuesday posts, today's post will take a look at a decades old technology that we still see a need for today- the DTL Sanitary Blender. We're going to cover the theory of operation and an example of a customer we recently worked with to solve a problem they were having introducing a dry powder into a liquid.
To begin, the DTL sanitary blenders are used for the incorporation of a dry ingredient into a wet one. A DTL or Tri blender basically consists of a centrifugal pump head and impeller mounted in such an orientation that the normal suction port, or inlet, is pointed upward. The inlet piping consists of a tube-within-a-tube arrangement- preventing wet-dry mixing and the prewetting phenomena.
The liquid inlet is mounted tangentially. The liquid entering the blender mixing chamber enters in the same direction the impeller is rotating. The impeller then strikes the liquid and accelerates it. Minimal splashing of liquid occurs which is how we can keep the power in the inlet tube dry. If splashing does occur, prewetting may occur and the powder tube can plug up.
The next element of the DTL blender is the discharge screen. As liquid is accelerated out of the pump chamber it strikes the blender screen creating a natural back pressure, forcing liquid back toward the eye of the impeller. This forms a hollow envelope into which the powder is introduced by the natural suction of the blender. This means that if the blender is operating properly, the inlet tube is always dry.
Now that we've covered the general operating parts of the DTL sanitary blender, let's take a look at two auxiliary components that are just as important- the feed and discharge pumps. All DTL blender set ups will require a feed pump. It is important to maintain a constant flow of liquid through the blender. Constant flow helps maintain a constant vacuum. Without a constant vacuum the powder addition rates will vary. If the blender is just running in a recirculation mode (normally pumping out of a tank, through the blender and back into the tank) a discharge pump in normally not required.
If there is a long distance of piping downstream of the blender, a discharge pump may be required. Too much back pressure on the blender will reduce the vacuum resulting in diminished blending. Increasing viscosity may also result in the necessity of a discharge pump. As powders are incorporated into liquids, viscosity tends to go up, so we need to size based on the final viscosity of the product.
As the viscosity climbs, we will need a discharge pump to maintain vacuum and pump product downstream. While the blender itself is a pump, when used as a pump, back pressure climbs, and the liquid envelope collapses. Depending on the viscosity of product, either a PD or a centrifugal discharge pump can be used. For more help sizing your feed and discharge pumps, contact Holland today.
Getting back to applications we can use the DTL sanitary blender in, let's look at a recent application a Holland Sales engineer encountered. Working with an end user, we found that their operators were having trouble lifting heavy bulk powder bags and dumping them into open top blend kettles. In addition to this physically taxing exercise, the side mount mixer they were using to incorporate the powder wasn't functioning effectively. To solve this problem, Holland worked with the end user to size and design a DTL set up that incorporated a table station that made for more ergonomic dry ingredient addition. In addition to boosting throughput and consistency of dry ingredient incorporation, we were also able to make the operators job's easier and plant managers job more stress free.
Contact us to discuss your requirements of pump spare parts. Our experienced sales team can help you identify the options that best suit your needs.