A long-time OEM customer of Eldridge’s had a unique design idea for a rail car washing and drying system. While other manufacturers were offering a two spindle system, one for washing and one for drying, our customer’s design incorporated the washing and drying functions into one spindle that made their system operationally more efficient. In order to make their system work as designed, they turned to Eldridge to design a rail car drying system that would deliver the required amount of air at the appropriate temperature.
Railroad Tank Car Cleaning
Before a railroad tank car can be used to transport a new load of bulk material, it must be thoroughly cleaned to prevent contaminating the new material with material from the previous shipment. The challenge with a washing and drying system is that it must be efficient to reduce the turn-around time, but not so powerful as to damage the lining of the tank car. Our OEM customer had found a way to improve the turn-around time with a one spindle system that thoroughly washed and dried the tank car without damaging the lining.
Eldridge’s Rail Car Dryer System
The requirements of the dryer system were to provide 7200 ACFM of filtered air at a temperature of 140°F at the spindle outlet. The sizing of the rainhood, heater and filter to meet the specifications required knowing how to efficiently balance air temperature, volume, laminar flow and speed through each component. After determining the system parameters upstream and downstream of the blower, we worked with our vendor, IAP, to select a direct drive blower that best fit the severe operating conditions which turned out to be 7200 ACFM, at 12 in W.G. and air temperature of 200°F. The picture below shows the completed railroad tank car dryer system mounted on a skid and ready to be shipped to our customer.
Conclusion
Eldridge’s 70+ years of knowledge and experience with ventilation and noise control was why our customer asked us to design and supply their rail car drying system. Our design team met the challenge and delivered a product that exceeded the customer’s expectations for cost and efficiency. If you ever have a unique ventilation system challenge, let the experts at Eldridge design and supply the system that best fits the requirements for your application.