Measuring and testing – Liquid analysis or analysis of the suspension of solids in a... – Lubricant testing
Reexamination Certificate
2000-10-02
2003-07-29
Larkin, Daniel S. (Department: 2856)
Measuring and testing
Liquid analysis or analysis of the suspension of solids in a...
Lubricant testing
C073S053010, C073S053070, C073S061630, C073S061420, C073S061430, C073S061520, C073S061550, C356S070000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06598464
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND
1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a process, method and apparatus to analyze fluids, specifically to the process, method and apparatus for separating, testing and analyzing oil and its contaminants.
2. Background Discussion of Prior Art
Industrial fluids, in particular organic and synthetic oils, are used to lubricate machinery components such as bearings and gears. The purpose of lubricating those surfaces is to increase component's life by reducing friction and by removing heat generated in the friction area.
Oil's physical characteristics such as color, viscosity and temperature and chemical characteristics such as total acid number (TAN), total base numbers (TBN), oxidation, etc. must be closely monitored in order to achieve longer machinery life. Solid and fluid contaminants should be separated to determine the failing component so that parts and preventative maintenance labor is scheduled to reduce costs.
For such purpose, oil samples should be tested and analyzed to understand its condition and to detect the onset of failure before it occurs. Oil samples should be properly separated, tested and analyzed to fully understand two variables:
a) Solid and fluid contaminants (contaminants)
b) Physical and chemical characteristics of oil (oil characteristics)
These two variables have been partially and individually addressed by a wide variety of methods and instruments, but never adequately combined in a process. These different methods and instruments had and still have significant problems. Test methods and instruments are difficult to use in industrial sites due to the large number and variety of different tests available, testing limitations that each tester has and the difficulty to accurately trend over time parameters that are critical for machine performance and reliability. Current methods do not include a process to separate contaminants prior to testing, which is critical for proper testing of oil physical and chemical characteristics. Current instruments are designed for lab environments and are not portable or rugged. Process parameters such as speed, percent load and product are not included in analysis which severely affects the understanding of the entire system composed of process-machine performance and its lubricants. Visual tests and visual trending are not used to simplify and communicate plant wide test results via software.
Several patents have been issued for oil testing methods and instrumentation. U.S. Pat. No. 2,889,736 to Ed M. Borg (1959) uses a light beam to determine approximate percentage of contaminants, U.S. Pat. No. 3,049,964 uses an optical means to indicate oil conditions, U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,578,865, 3,364,812, 3,731,743, 3,714,444, 3,734,629 all employ light as a source for test one of oils many unknowns. U.S. Pat. No. 3,182,255 to Hopkins (1965) uses a capacitor sensor, U.S. Pat. No. 4,082,511 to Pricon (1978) does TAN and TBN testing, U.S. Pat. No. 4,651,560 uses a filtration method, and many other patents address testing oils partially. U.S. Pat. No. 4,047,814 to Wescott provides a method to determine type, size and distribution of metallic particles, testing oil partially since physical and chemical characteristics are not tested. U.S. Pat. No. 5,506,501 assigned to CSI (1996) prepares samples of oil by separating magnetic and non magnetic particles only testing oils partially. U.S. Pat. No. 5,517,427 to Carlton S. Joyces (1996) uses an infrared spectrometer and an optical emission spectrometer for testing which are large equipment used in lab environments that could not be utilized in harsh industrial environments. U.S. Pat. No. 5,262,732 to Dickert et al. uses a capacitor grid sensor to determine contaminant levels. Magnetic and non magnetic particles are clumped together which makes it hard to perform visual inspection and differentiate among particles. Lightweight process contaminants such as plastic pellets, powders such as flour and condiments tend to stay afloat and never precipate down to the capacitor grid and therefore providing erroneous readings. When contaminants are of small sizes, they tend to remain above and beyond the magnetic field strength taking too long for particles to settle down at the bottom of the capacitor grid. U.S. Pat. No. 5,817,928 to CSI Technology, Inc provides a method for evaluating a multiplicity of lubrication quality parameters that are assigned to categories of wear, chemistry and contaminants. This method provides indices for representing each categories which tends to confuse operators who are not familiar with index numbers and can not be correlated to any other tests or methods. This software doesn't provide a method for including process parameters such as speed, load and product critical to understanding machine performance. It uses a particle counter which provides an index number proportional to ferrous and non-ferrous particles larger than a predetermined minimum and therefore many particles are not counted leading to erroneous results. This method doesn't provide a process to separate particles prior to testing for oil chemistry which leads to erroneous and misleading results. U.S. Pat. No. 5,588,535 to Thornton et al. provides a separation method. Particles are separated as magnetic and non-magnetic and according to sizes but it is done in three different groups which limits trending capabilities of the particles. It prepares the samples for specific lab testers such as energy dispersive x-ray fluorescent EDXRF, machine designed for lab environments. This system does not test for oil's chemical and physical characteristics. U.S. Pat. No. 3,526,127 to Sarkis (1969) tests for viscosity, IR characteristics and metal content of an oil sample, nevertheless it has a severe limitation in the particle detection range between 5-15 microns. This system does not test for oil's chemical and physical characteristics. Kits have been used for testing oil characteristics and contaminants. Commercially available kits such as Kittiwake Developments Ltd. have been available for quite some time. These kits have been used in remote locations such as mining or off-shore oil exploration but have not been widely accepted in the manufacturing industry due to their size, lack of portability or extreme simplicity. They tend to test either particle separation or chemical characteristics of oil. Another test kit introduced in the oil testing is U.S. Pat. No. 5,313,824 by Herguth (1994) whose kit visually analyzes the “deterioration” of oil by using a blotter paper. The resulting blot is visually compared with standard samples that are descriptive of different deterioration levels. This method does not have software that can document, communicate and trend information. This method does not test for physical characteristics of oil or contaminants.
Disadvantages:
1. Oil analysis is done to determine the chemical and physical conditions of oil and to determine the presence and the origins of contaminant particles. The chemical and physical conditions are needed to change the oil at the right time, before it stops reducing friction. The origin of contaminants is needed to determine which is the failing component that needs to be replaced. None of the prior art references uncovered in the search shows a process for separating of contaminants to isolate contaminant origins prior to the testing and analysis of the chemical and physical characteristics of industrial oils. Current testing techniques simultaneously test for both oil condition and contaminants without separation of contaminants prior to testing of oil characteristics. This creates three main problems. 1) Testing results measuring a combination of particles and contaminants without understanding particle's origin defeats the purpose of the analysis. This, in addition, leads to confusing and costly results since an entire system may be replaced where only one part may be failing and may need replacing. 2) Some testing methods are affected significantly by the lack of separation. For example, part
Cygan Michael
Larkin Daniel S.
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