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Quotes - Engineering - SalesDairy Processing
Pasteurizing, Cooling and Whey Duty
Dairy is the market Mueller is best known in, and the equipment reflects it. Pasteurizing, product cooling, whey concentration support, CIP heating and cold water supply are all covered by the same two technologies.
Pasteurizing. Regeneration, heating and cooling sections in a single frame, with the pressure differential rule keeping pasteurized product above raw product at all times. Regeneration efficiency is where the operating cost sits.
Protein burn-on. Run length between cleans follows surface temperature. A closer approach lets a cooler medium do the same job, which is frequently the single change that doubles run time on a dairy pasteurizer.
Whey and by-products. Higher solids, more fouling and often higher viscosity. Free-Flow plates and generous cleaning access matter more here than on fluid milk.
Typical Specification
- Typical duty: Pasteurizing, product cooling, whey, CIP heating
- Product contact: Type 316 stainless
- Frames: Type 304 stainless, unpainted
- Sections: Regeneration, heating and cooling in one frame
- Pressure rule: Pasteurized side held above raw side
- Fouling mechanism: Protein burn-on at the heating surface
- Particulates: Free-Flow plate where solids are present
- Cleaning: CIP, with frame opening for inspection
- Cold water: Falling film chiller for near-freezing supply
- Farm side: Pre-cooling before the bulk tank
On-Farm Milk Cooling
Pre-Cool First, Then Recover What Is Left
On-farm milk cooling is a heat recovery problem before it is a refrigeration problem. Milk leaves the cow near body temperature and has to reach storage temperature quickly, both for quality and for the milk buyer. Doing all of that with refrigeration is the expensive way.
Pre-cool first. Running milk against well or municipal water before it reaches the tank typically brings it down to within a few degrees of the water temperature. That removes most of the heat load before the refrigeration system starts, which cuts run time, energy cost and wear on the condensing unit. An Accu-Therm plate pack does the duty, and it opens for inspection and takes more plates if the herd grows.
Then recover what is left. Whatever the refrigeration system does have to remove leaves as heat at the condenser, and on most farms it goes into the yard. A Fre-Heater intercepts it and puts it into the farm hot water system instead — water you were going to pay to heat anyway for parlour washing and tank CIP.
Where a second barrier is required. The local authority decides what has to sit between the two media, not preference. Where a vented interspace is called for, the double-wall plate provides it, and any breach reports to atmosphere rather than into the other fluid.
The Water Side Decides Everything
Around two litres of water per litre of milk is the assumption behind the performance figures, and it is the assumption most often broken in practice. If the well cannot deliver that at peak flow, or the pump is undersized, or the plumbing throttles it, the milk reaches the tank warmer than the calculation predicted.
It is worth measuring the water actually available at peak rather than the pump's rated output. That one number explains most of the pre-coolers that are reported as underperforming.
Flow Profile, Not Herd Size
The number that sizes a pre-cooler is peak milk flow through it, not the size of the herd. A parlour that puts a large volume through in a short window needs more cooler, and more water, than the same herd milked over a longer period. A robot delivering a near-continuous trickle is a different problem again.
Send the peak flow and the milking pattern rather than the cow count, and the selection follows from it.
Common FAQs
Protein denaturation and burn-on at the heating surface, which depends on the surface temperature rather than the bulk temperature. Lowering the medium temperature and adding plate area usually lengthens run time considerably.
So any leak in regeneration flows from pasteurized into raw rather than the reverse. It is a regulatory requirement, and it constrains pump placement and valve arrangement across the whole system.
Yes, separated by connector grids. It saves space, piping and cost against three separate exchangers and is the normal arrangement on HTST systems.
Higher fouling and often higher viscosity. The Free-Flow plate handles solids-bearing streams, and generous cleaning access matters more than on fluid milk.
It depends almost entirely on your incoming water temperature and how much water you can deliver at peak. Send those two numbers with your peak milk flow and the saving can be worked for your farm rather than quoted from a brochure.
After the refrigeration system, not instead of it. It takes heat the condenser would otherwise reject into the yard and puts it into the hot water system. It is covered under Heat Recovery.
Preference does not come into it - the local authority decides what has to sit between the two media. Settle that with them while you are still specifying, not when the inspector arrives: a double-wall unit is physically larger for the same duty, so it changes the layout as well as the price.
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