Keystone cops key installation for Caffrey's
15 Jan 2000
Easy-clean quarter-turn flow control equipment from Keystone is being used on key duties in a new £3.1m brewhouse at Bass's Ulster Brewery in County Antrim.
The automated brewhouse, which came on line in 1996, is initially expected to produce 600 000 barrels of Caffrey's Irish Ale per year, eventually rising to 1 million barrels. The new brewhouse replaces an older plant which operated for two decades, achieving a maximum capacity of 400 000 barrels per year.
The Keystone valves open and close the brewery's wort lines, controlling the rate of flow to two main mash filters. Accurate flow control is essential, explains the company, to make sure the wort is as clear as possible and to improve extract recovery.Figure 990 butterfly valves and K-Lok high performance butterfly valves.
The brewery uses two butterfly valve types, the Figure 990 and the K-Lok high-performance models. The Figure is a split-body, wafer-type valve, designed to provide a high flow capacity with very low pressure drop, reducing fobbing problems in carbonated products.
K-Lok valves have a seat configuration which provides continuous and extremely tight disc/seat contact when closed. Its double-offset Equalinear disc combines high strength, high flow capacity and excellent flow characteristics with minimum seat wear, claims Keystone.
The valves are controlled by quarter-turn pneumatic actuators, featuring a totally enclosed rack-and-pinion design with no external moving parts. The actuators are all factory lubricated, requiring no maintenance under normal working conditions. This was a major consideration for Bass. At peak periods, the batch brewing process is in operation virtually continuously, so there is little or no downtime for maintenance or repairs.
The successful operation of the Keystone equipment at the County Antrim brewery has led to Bass placing a second, similar order for valves and actuators for its new brewhouse in Glasgow.
