Why tough environments and thermal stress are no match for the robust FORJ
What does a dusty mining environment have in common with a spotlessly clean laboratory? They’re both places you’re likely to find analytical instruments!
Common analytical techniques, such as X-ray fluorescence (XRF), atomic absorption (AA), or inductively coupled plasma (ICP) analysis, are used in a whole range of settings – from underground mines and cement factories to research labs. Industrial environments generally need high throughput, with close to 100% uptime to avoid breaking the analytical chain. When time is money, downtime for maintenance is very expensive!
To deliver great analysis in all these environments, our instruments need to be robust. A great example is our brand-new fusion instrument, FORJ™.
Why resilience is key
Borate fusion is a popular method of sample preparation for XRF, AA, and ICP. These techniques are widely used in many industries – which is why we designed FORJ to be rugged enough for almost any environment.
But fusion itself is an intensive process. The instrument’s internal furnace must go from room temperature to 1250° C and back again up to four times per hour, which translates to a lot of thermal stress on the instrument itself.
Designed for less (thermal) stress
Our solution? Smarter design. We listened carefully to our partners’ feedback and took their suggestions to the drawing board. And it paid off – FORJ is very resilient, needing less maintenance and fewer spare parts than other fusion instruments. Operation is easier and smoother overall too, giving easy access to the platinumware and glass disks.
Thanks to FORJ’s patented handling mechanism for crucibles and molds, it’s now only these components that experience any thermal stress at all! There is less material inside the furnace during heating, protecting the rest of the instrument and – an added bonus – making heating faster and the fusion cycle shorter.
A clean solution for oxidizing fumes
Fusion generates oxidizing fumes, which can affect both your sample preparation and the instrument itself if they aren’t handled properly. If there are rods above the crucible during fusion, these fumes can come into contact with them – which can lead to sample contamination, as well as damage to the rods themselves. (And frequent replacement can get quite expensive!) To avoid this issue, FORJ design relocates these rods so that they are outside the furnace.
However, those fumes still have the potential to damage other parts of the furnace that aren’t so easily designed around. That means they should leave the heating chamber as efficiently as possible. FORJ features air intake underneath the instrument, which forces the fumes upwards through chimneys built into the heating chamber. And all that dust that might be in the air? It’s no match for FORJ’s easily replaceable filters!
Delivering analysis for everyone
Robustness is always important, but the mining, metals, and cement industries know more than most about tough environments. We created FORJ to be perfect for these industries, based on our years of experience in building sensitive analytical instruments that can truly be used by every customer.
And that’s how smart design makes no-stress fusion possible – anywhere!
Talk to us today to discover how FORJ can make sample prep a strong link in your analytical chain!
Curious about the full specs? Dive into the FORJ brochure here.
We’ll be back next month to explore speed and throughput – follow us on LinkedIn to catch the next article as it’s released! If this is the first you’re hearing about FORJ, check out our previous blog about it here.