Back at it again,
So this week I started working on the 2nd column full of ground Zimmermedia. The first one busted from too much pressure. I spent time grinding more media (which still takes forever and annoys my life; probably one of the most tedious things I’ve done in my life) and remaking the challenge water because the old batch had been sitting too long. Tuesday morning, I came in early to finish grinding, the column length was almost perfect to 15.7cm with some compression and a flow rate of 3ml/min. I added some more media until it was the exact length. I was racing against the clock to start by 10am because I have a specific sampling schedule that needs to be followed. The later I started, the later I would have to stay that day. S0 starting the experiment at 10am, my last sample of the day was 10:30pm. Which is fine, that’s the only late day. Nevertheless, upon starting the experiment, the E-33 and Zimmermedia columns were running simultaneously perfectly fine. Well about an hour and a half into the experiment, with the same flow rate from the pump, the Zimmermedia column built up pressure once again. The media had compressed to 10cm and shifted down the column by 2cm. We only got 2 samples from the media which were taken 5 and 50 minutes after the experiment began. So, hopefully when we analyze those two, we will get some results about the arsenic concentration levels after filtration. The E-33 column has been running fine with no problems. Therefore, I was collecting samples on that test only, instead of both. We’ve come to the conclusion that grinding the media to desired sieve size does not work in column tests. Too much pressure is built up. As a result, I remade the column using 1.1cm inner diameter glass columns, this time, with raw media, not ground. This should work considering the size of the media is between 1.15-1.25mm in diameter. There will be room for water flow over the media and down the column. It should work flawlessly.
Until next time
-Chris
UPDATE: Sorry there are no pictures on this week. I have been extremely busy, so I hope you enjoy the traditional blog style of a rant and story. I probably won’t blog about this past week since it was hectic and I would like to not think about it. I will do my best to post a reflection about the upcoming week and explain the events that happened.