In many areas of the world, dust clouds pose a severe challenge to various businesses. The Australian enterprise OZmist, based in Wangaratta in the northeast corner of the state of Victoria, has driven innovation into new and uncharted territory and developed a solution applicable across many trades.
Being locally owned and operated, innovation is at this company’s core. With 20 years of experience, the company has maintained a proactive approach to R&D and have shown the ability to adapt current designs to suit different environments for their applications. OZmist is continuously looking at ways to design new products or to modify existing ones and LINAK® actuators play a central part.
“Our first mist cannon is unique and comprises a tandem wheel trailer fitted with a 2,000 liter aluminum tank, high pressure pump and fan, which throws mist 50 meters. All run from a generator which is fitted to the draw bar,” explains Dean McDonald, Director of OZmist and adds:
“With 2,000 liters of water on board the trailer can be towed by most SUVs”.
Dust is a major issue particularly in some rural Australian working environments. It not only affects the air quality for workers, but also the wider community as plants and crops tend to suffer as well. According to Dean McDonald, this is the motivation for many customers to invest in their products. If companies are doing the right thing, they also follow the requirements of the EPA (Environment Protection Authority) and the local councils.
Built to work in harsh environments
Mist cannons typically operate through the use of a pump, which transfers water from the onboard tank and pumps it at a high pressure through rings of nozzles at the outlet of the cannon. A fan blows millions of tiny water droplets which exit the nozzles to create a mist.
Although mist cannons have been used as a mister at large concerts or gatherings to cool patrons, they are traditionally designed for dust suppression in harsh environments such as mining, demolition, excavation, road building, and for concrete plants where the millions of water droplets from the fan attach themselves to the dust particles and drop them to the ground.
A LINAK actuator is a key component in these mist cannons as it is used to lift and lower the outlet of the cannon to adjust the throwing distance of the mist.
Taking LINAK on as a partner
During 2018, OZmist developed its first mist cannon for dust control. Today they manufacture two variations of the product, both using LINAK actuators. During the design process, OZmist needed a heavy-duty, robust, reliable, and water-resistant actuator that they could build into their system. After trial and error and failed actuators from other suppliers, OZmist found LINAK. That relieved them of a central worry:
“The actuator is subjected to a huge amount of vibration and has to be able to lift the heavy cannon as well as withstand life outdoors and in very dusty environments,” Dean McDonald says and points to the fact that the LA36 fits ideally into the system due to its programmable configuration, robust construction and reliability in these harsh environments.
LINAK Account Manager Ron Diocera also saw a match between LINAK and OZmist right from the start.
“When we first met Dean and the OZmist team, we believed in their system as a solution to an ongoing issue of airborne hazardous dust in the industry, which is a major risk to the health of workers. It resonated right away with what LINAK is about. They needed a reliable dust suppression system and local support and we had the solution to suit them”.
Local support is essential
As the only Australian manufacturer making these types of mist cannons, OZmist prides itself on sourcing local suppliers to assist them in further innovation and improvements.
“There is nothing worse than having a machine on site that no one can fix or parts are on the other side of the world,” says McDonald. “Building them from scratch in Australia allows us to be in control of quality and the end product that the consumer receives”.
Technical support from LINAK also played a large part in the decision making as communication and feedback were important to the final product.
“If we have a failure, we all want to know why so we can fix it,” says Dean McDonald, who thereby speaks directly to central LINAK cornerstones – to provide precise and reliable adjustment of various industrial applications and to work with customers to ensure the right solution for their product.
The LINAK segment, TECHLINE®, has a special focus on movement solution for even the most extreme conditions.
Want to know more? Visit the LINAK® TECHLINE® website or contact your local LINAK office.
You can find more about mist cannons and other climate tech products at the OZmist corporate website.
