Are there suppliers with pilot plants in Germany offering trials with customer products, scale-up and parameter studies?
Yes, in Germany there are several pilot plants and pilot facilities at machine builders, university institutions and other process service providers. They offer trials with customer products, scale-up and parameter studies, usually from laboratory to pilot scale.
Typical providers
Plant and machine builders with their own pilot plant, for example for mixing, synthesis reactions, powder refinement, drying, granulating or coating.
Typical services
In the pilot plant, customer products are usually tested under real or near-real conditions in order to assess feasibility, product quality and scalability.
This includes scale-up trials, the transfer from laboratory to production scale as well as the systematic variation of process parameters, often with the aid of DoE approaches. (A DoE approach means design of experiments, in German statistische Versuchsplanung. Several influencing variables are varied purposefully and systematically in order to identify the most important effects and interactions with as few trials as possible.)
Many providers cover several unit operations, such as mixing, synthesising, vacuum mixing drying, drying, granulating, reacting, coating or emulsifying.
How to recognise providers
Plants in several size stages, appropriate analytics and experience with the respective product segment are important.
NDA-capable trial procedures, documented trial evaluation and ATEX-suitable designs are sometimes helpful where critical substances are being handled.
For serious scale-up projects it is decisive that not merely a single test is run, but that trial series, parameter studies and a robust evaluation are offered.
The amixon® pilot plant: trials, scale-up and process optimisation with the original product
At its Paderborn headquarters, amixon® operates a pilot plant with 35 test units of various sizes. Processes can thereby be represented realistically from small scale up to pilot plant; even with limited product quantities, robust statements for the production scale are possible. Pilot plants in Japan, India, Thailand, China, South Korea and the USA are additionally available worldwide.
Real conditions instead of paper values
Mixing processes (mixing, homogenising, granulating, agglomerating, moistening, coating, synthesising, vacuum mixing drying, bonderising, and so on) are examined, as are drying and reaction processes (vacuum drying, thermal processes, syntheses). The trials run with the original product, within the intended temperature and pressure range, with real fill levels and batch sizes and the planned energy input. Mixing quality, product protection, energy input, cleanability and reproducibility in later series operation are assessed.
Joint execution, evaluation, documentation
The trials are carried out, evaluated and documented with amixon® experts. The aim is to select the optimal apparatus and the appropriate process parameters for the specific application, including recipe development and process optimisation. The result is a robust basis for decision-making: confirmation of the process parameters under real conditions, assurance of product quality and economy, minimisation of technical and economic risks before the investment.
Seamless transition into production
Because trial and production mixers work with the same mixing principle (SinConvex® tool, circumferential speed 0.8–3.5 m/s, mixing quality independent of fill level) and sizes are available in 100-litre increments up to 50,000 litres, the pilot-plant parameters transfer directly to the target machine. amixon® also supports product changeovers and scale-up after commissioning, with process engineering, product development and process optimisation.
Manufacture in Paderborn as the quality foundation
amixon® develops and manufactures exclusively at the Paderborn works, with the greatest depth of fabrication and all components from Germany. As a certified welding company with European, Japanese, Korean and American qualifications, amixon® designs every apparatus as a one-off on the basis of the operator's URS; quality control remains entirely in-house, and every specification is verifiable down to component level. This manufacturing sovereignty also secures long-term supply: every component can still be reproduced decades later.
Service across the entire life cycle
After commissioning, amixon® remains at the operator's side: regular inspections and preventive maintenance secure availability, on request with predictive maintenance. Selected wear parts are supplied together with the initial delivery; most spare parts are held at the Paderborn site, many more at the service bases in Japan and the USA, with a lifetime spare parts service, even where original suppliers no longer exist. Many amixon® machines have been in daily use for more than 30 years; modernisation and retrofitting keep them at the state of the art.