Solids Solutions: where powder reveals its secrets

Powder seems harmless – until it gets stuck in your hopper, clumps together in the silo or causes the filling machine to malfunction. That’s when you realise just how unruly a handful of fine granules can be. At Solids Solutions (officially Delft Solids Solutions) in Wateringen, they know all about it. This company focuses on the physical properties of solids.

Who is Solids Solutions?

Solids Solutions is a CRO, a contract research organisation. The company specialises in powders and granules and has over 40 years’ experience. The experts examine porosity and specific surface area, particle size and shape, chemical composition and bulk behaviour. Clients come from the pharmaceutical, chemical, food and animal feed, cosmetics, paints and coatings, automotive and building materials sectors.

The company does more than just take measurements. It also develops new techniques and equipment, provides consultancy services and runs courses and seminars through its own Academy. Anyone facing a persistent problem with their product or process can turn to them for troubleshooting.

Powder characterisation: understand first, then control

Around 80 per cent of all industrial processes involve solids. Yet powder does not behave like a liquid. That is why powder characterisation forms the basis of any effective process optimisation. How cohesive is your material? How dense and how compressible? And how do moisture, particle shape and particle size distribution affect its behaviour?

Solids Solutions offers a wide range of test methods:

• shear tests according to Jenike, Peschl or Schulze;
• the Hosokawa Powder Tester, which determines the Carr index;
• caking tests using uniaxial compaction;
• density measurements according to Heubach and EN 15051;
• investigations into attrition, segregation, electrical conductivity and triboelectric charging.

This way, you don’t rely on gut feeling, but on hard data about what your powder does and why.

Powder flow: from frustration to smooth flow

Do you know where most production problems start? With powder flow that doesn’t go as planned. Powder forms bridges across a discharge opening, flows erratically or sticks to the walls. The result is downtime, inconsistent dosing and a loss of quality.

Solids Solutions measures powder flow using methods such as ring shear tests. This enables them to determine how powder behaves under pressure and after storage. With this knowledge, you can design silos and hoppers more effectively and fine-tune dosing systems. You can also assess whether a formulation or additive genuinely improves flow. A pharmaceutical company can thus prevent uneven capsule filling. A food manufacturer can obtain a spice mix that doses consistently.

Sharing knowledge, for your team too

What makes this company particularly commendable is that it shares its knowledge. Courses such as ‘Powders & Granules’ regularly sell out, and additional sessions are being added. Courses on particle size and porosity also attract participants from both home and abroad. In addition, the company is working on innovative projects, such as a portable oxygen generator and coated fertilisers with controlled release. It has also recently become capable of analysing nanoparticles using Nanoparticle Tracking Analysis.