Trace identification
Question
After a cleaning process, surfaces can sometimes not be as clean as expected.
In order to improve its bottle cleaning process, our customer turned to Materia Nova to identify the source of the problem: surface degradation, inadequately rinsed detergent residues or other surface pollution.
Expertise
By using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) coupled with EDX analysis, our experts were able to clearly identify the origin of the problem.
Solution
Firstly, the analyses showed that it was a deposit and not a degradation. Secondly, the deposit was nothing more than a residue of limestone on top of the titanium coating, which remained intact.
It was therefore the quality of the rinsing water that caused the problem.
The SEM, coupled with the EDX detector, is useful for observing and identifying the composition of residues.