When It’s Time for Industrial Analytical Testing

When you have industrial production and things go wrong in the plant processes or the filtration system, you may need to get an industrial analysis done. This means that any industrial process can go awry due to impurities in the water itself and it may take some careful analyses to discover what issues exist in the plant process. If this is the case, you need to call on a full-service laboratory for industrial analytical testing.

Here is an example: Say you have a company that makes filters for lab mice, and that has to be a very controlled environment. When something goes wrong, like a failed O-ring or valve that leaks, there may be some powdery buildup on the equipment. If this occurs in a cartridge filter, the whole filter can be tested to make sure it isn’t due to some leak in the filter, but it could also be due to some water quality issue.

This can happen in a medical testing facility, a pump or other manufacturing facility or a lab filter of some sort. These all require a highly controlled environment and the water is essential to the entire process. 

Tracing a Problem to Its Source

Sometimes in manufacturing, there is some deviation in the end product, and then manufacturers have to figure out what went wrong. Analytical water testing can be used to backtrack and figure out what went wrong, identifying the source of the problem. At times, these plants cannot determine what is causing the irregularity or imperfection but if the water is fully tested, the actual root cause may show up. This can help the industrial companies figure out some of their problems in their plant process.

Also, sometimes there is corrosion or other unidentified substances on components or on pumps or other equipment that needs to be identified. The analytical lab testing processes can usually analyze the water and find what is causing the corrosion. Here is an example: A company’s cooling system pumps, located in a pond, kept failing. Testing found there was excessive salt in the pond. It was tracked down to the employee parking lot which was constantly salted in winter. This salt was being absorbed into the pond, causing the pumps to fail.

Another time you would want to use industrial analytical testing is to determine the chemical composition of certain products. For example, you may want to test hand sanitizer to verify alcohol content, or other products that say there is so much of an ingredient and you want to confirm that it is accurate.

Maintaining Quality Through Accurate Testing

The type of equipment used in industrial analytical testing can include many devices, such as a scanning electron microscope, and other highly technical instruments.

To summarize, industrial analytical testing can help to uncover undetected issues in the industrial processes, and avoid bigger industrial problems, including:

  • Why a mechanical device fails
  • Why there is a deviation in the end product
  • What unwanted substances exist on components, equipment and in the water

With careful monitoring of the impurities in various streams, facility operators can proactively reduce damage from corrosion, deposits, and scaling. Regular industrial water testing is essential for quality control and process optimization across industry.

Cooling systems, circulating systems and boiler feed systems can all avoid corrosion as well as scale formation when their water supply is high quality. Organic slime and sediment can also be avoided when water testing has pointed out the impurities in the water supply.

To find out more about industrial analytic testing to help you avoid major industrial problems and perform the correct treatment, please call ETR Labs at (800) 344-9977 or learn more about our industrial testing here.