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Transfer Panels
Electrol Specialties Company was among the nations earliest fabricators of U-Bend Transfer Panels. The first generation of these components were used to establish CIP supply paths and the panels were commonly referred to as Cleaning Hook-Up Stations. The drawing to the left shows the most widely used Standard configurations which include:
  Two-Port: The replacement of a spool piece with a U-Bend. These came into use only after the development of Proximity Switch sensors to verify U-Bend presence or absence between any two ports, after the transfer of this technology to the pharmaceutical industry.
Three-Port (Triangular): The three port arrangement on an equilateral triangle can be used to establish three different paths at the junction of any three
lines.
Four-Port (Diamond): The addition of the fourth port forming two equilateral triangle could be used to establish five different paths at the junction of four lines.
Six-Port (Hexagon): Though used initially as a CHS for controlling flow to sprays in a group of tanks, it's equilateral triangle
arrangement made it applicable also for small product transfer panels which required connections to a common (center) port, and the addition of several supplemental ports arranged in the triangular or diamond configuration often met the design
requirement..
These panels are fabricated in single plate versions, or as boxes to provide for installation of proximity sensors. A small pharmaceutical column mounted version is shown in the photo to the right.
The CIP Unit in the background is an early pharmaceutical version of the Single-Tank Single-Use system in Dairy use for 25 years prior to this application in the clean room of a sterile process in 1983. The Transfer Panel was recognized as a means of organizing and supporting filters in the piping system and two panels to serve this purpose are shown in the photo to the right. Small panels of the approximate
dimension shown in the photographs can be supplied for mounting on legs, on columns, or through wall openings, and approach which places the face in the operating area, but locates the piping to areas behind the wall, often in utility or even warehouse space.
  Internal Headers -
The need for substantial expansion in size and complexity led to the use of horizontal headers and vertical internal manifolds, both of loop-type construction to eliminate all dead-legs, with the
recognition that a 1-1/2" loop had the same liquid carrying capacity as a 2" single tube. The ports and U-Bends were mostly sized 1-1/2" for overall reduction in panel
space. A small but very flexible panel in the photograph at the right combined three hexagon
arrangements with two headers for CIP supply and return connections. The lower photograph of the interior shows the vertical CIPS loop and the flat CIPR loop at the bottom. The enclosure also houses the proximity sensors and wiring terminations. This panel was supported on stainless steel legs fabricated of Schedule 40 pipe.
A different design using headers above and below the common terminations for lines to and from tanks is shown at the right and in this instance the customer specified support by substantial stainless steel columns. The U-Bends used on the panels in both of the above photographs were fitted with housings for magnets to operate the proximity switches, as shown in the photograph to the right. A variety of different types of Proximity Sensors are now available and ESC will build to customer
specifications. A dairy installation of a column mounted transfer with looped headers is shown at the left.
Options Include:
Transfer Panels may be single thickness , flat or with radius edges to fit to a wall.
They may also be fabricated as boxes for through the wall installation, or mounting on legs
Electrol's engineers will review and revise submitted criteria and develop
designs which minimize the number of U-Bend lengths.
FLASH
!!! - Electrol Specialties Company now operates the only Water-Jet
Cutting machine in the stateline area, and uses it to provide fast and
efficient cutting of all hole patterns in any thickness of metal required
for transfer panel fabrication. This method of creating holes prevents
the stress and distortion added to the metal by punching or flame cutting.
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