isopropyl alcohol filter

[sphelps]

I ordered some oil absorbing mat which can be used to filter oil from water however I'm pretty sure it's not going to work. A little research shows the mat absorbs all hydrocarbons so water can obviously pass through because it's not a hydrocarbon but alcohol is a hydrocarbon so I think this experiment is already flawed.

[sphelps]

OK so the mat is out, it absorbed the alcohol as well and the solution that did make it through contained the same amount of oil. Basically in this application it's just expensive cloth.

[superduperwesman]

Prob have to use some solvent as mentioned, or some kinda flash tank. The alcohol should boil around 84 C but the oil would be much higher so you could prob separate them this way? Any reason why the parts washer can't run with warm-> hot alcohol?

[sphelps]

Originally Posted by superduperwesman

Prob have to use some solvent as mentioned, or some kinda flash tank. The alcohol should boil around 84 C but the oil would be much higher so you could prob separate them this way? Any reason why the parts washer can't run with warm-> hot alcohol?

Yeah fractional distillation would be the best way to reuse the alcohol but this is something I'd rather avoid. Our production staff are not the most careful people around and I don't mean to say they aren't smart but they have managed to do some pretty stupid things. The last thing I want is to add is highly flammable vapor into their routine, I'd much rather keep things simple and safe if possible. Also have to consider the cost of distilling, the energy required for the process is significant in comparison to the cost of the alcohol.

I don't want to heat up the alcohol in the washer either, this would not exactly be safe. I actually have a thermo switch installed which shuts the system down if the fluid gets too warm.

[superduperwesman]

Soluble in water... so anyway you can mix it with water to lose the oil and then separate it from the water after?

[superduperwesman]

... but getting it out of the water would prob involve heat too ahah

Solvent it is ahah

[superduperwesman]

In soluble is salt solutions? So what would happen if you mixed it with water and then added salt ahah. The salt just wouldn't dissolve or it would dissolve and separate the alcohol?

So far we have add water, add salt... and it still prob won't work ahah