Best Desiccant for your Applications
Desiccants play a crucial role in maintaining the integrity of applications by controlling moisture levels and removing particulate contamination in lubricants, fluids, and equipment. Our company provides two types of desiccants in our rigorous units, Silica Gel and Molecular Sieve. Desiccant performs through a process known as adsorption, similar to “absorption.” The one letter difference in the word makes a large impact. Absorption is the process where molecules are soaked up into something like a sponge, while adsorption is where the molecules are stuck to the desiccant like a magnet. Adsorption is important since this is what makes our products out-perform all others.
Our Silica Gel breathers carry color changing Silica Gel Desiccant indicating when the silica gel has been spent. Our blue indicating desiccant will turn pink when completely spent, letting the user know when it is time to act in getting the desiccant breather replaced. Silica gel differs from molecular sieve in the regeneration stage. Silica gel has a low regeneration temperature level of about 95°F, which is fairly easy to reach in most cases. This is beneficial since regeneration can happen simply by baking in an oven at 90°F-95°F, yet there is a disadvantage in the low temperature. Applications that our units are attached to such as wind turbines and gear box breathers, often reach temperatures close to the regeneration temperature. Because these applications operate at elevated temperatures it can cause the silica gel to regenerate itself expelling the moisture back into the application and causing damage. As temperatures increase, Silica Gel performance drops drastically unlike Molecular sieve.
Molecular Sieve, such as our Zeozorb® blend, is a mixture of blue and tan indicating zeolite that will turn all tan when spent, alerting the user that it is time to change the desiccant. Molecular sieves take significantly more heat to regenerate, causing the desiccant to be more durable in harsh conditions. This is the market differentiator for our proprietary ZEOZORB® desiccant blend. Our molecular sieve absorbs moisture and traps pesky dirt particles that could hinder your applications service life.