A SYSTEM FOR EFFECTING AUTOMATIC SAMPLE ANALYSIS AND A METHOD OF ESTABLISHING THE SYSTEM

Abstract: For an automatic carrying out of successive NIR-analyses of material samples, it is known to feed the samples to a test chamber having a window located adjacent to the optical head of an NIR-analyser, this window being kept clean in being covered by a film that is advanced a full stop prior to each new sample filling of the chamber. According to the invention a simplified technique is used where the window is constituted by the front glass (68) of the optical head, this head being mounted in a box (6) which is movable past a simple cleaning unit (86, 88). With the invention it is possible to adapt an existing laboratory equipment (2, 10) to on-line operation.

Description: A system for effecting automatic sample analysis and a method of establishing the system. The present invention relates to a sampling and analysing equipment for use in systems for receiving raw materials, in particular biological materials, and delivering the same in smaller portions or delivering materials in mixed or processed condition. In WO/89/11090 is already described the advantages of using an automatic sampling equipment, from which samples of newly received materials can be rapidly transferred to a central analysing station, wherein the single samples are quickly analysed, thus enabling a quality determina¬ tion of the new materials as a basis for a correct accounting in view of the qualities as well as for a rapid adjustment of processing or mixing conditions, should the new materials exhibit changed properties, e.g. regarding their contents of fat, water or protein, a typical relevant enterprise being one preparing fodder mixtures for livestock. The equipment disclosed in the said WO publication is relatively expensive, and it is well applicable in large enterprises, but in practice it is not suited for use in smaller enterprises, where it will be an economical overload to arrange for automatic samplers and a pneumatic conveyor system between the sampling system and the analysing equipment. At least to a certain extent it is fully acceptable to manually carry the samples to the analysing equipment, and the latter may well be simplified. In connection with the invention it has been recognized that in fact it is possible to modify an existing laboratory equipment so as to make it usable for automatic, successive sample handling and analysing, such that with a relatively modest investment it is still possible to achieve a noticeable increase of the analysing capacity with a minimum of labouring. Especially two laboratory units are here in focus, viz. an analyzer based on the so-called NIR principle and a grinding mill for comminuting the material to be analysed. In their known standard designs both of these units require a careful manual cleaning prior to each new operation, and for the invention it is decisive that the required cleaning can take place automatically immediately after each operation, such that the equipment will rapidly be ready for handling a new material sample, without this being unduly contaminated by remnants of the previously handled sample material. The commonly used grinding mills are highly unfit for being cleaned in a simple and automatic manner. These mills have a knife rotor rotating inside a surrounding screen, outside which there is a an annular bowl for eeceiving the comminuted material. This bowl unit is made with rather sharp inner corners, and even if it is reasonably easy to clean manually, it will be difficult to clean in any simple, automatic way. Accord¬ ing to the invention such a mill may be modified to form an automatically easily cleanable unit, viz. by replac¬ ing the said bowl unit by rigid insert parts, which, together, delimit a receiver chamber having an evenly curved outer wall which is much easier to clean than the conventional bowls with sharp edges, e.g. with the use of air nozzles. Besides, the insert parts may form a tangential outlet, thus enabling the mille to work on¬ line. The laboratory units for NIR analysing comprise a cabinet having an optical head, against which can be placed a cuvette holding but a few grams of the material that is to be analysed upon being comminuted. After each operation the cuvette should be cleaned with spirit, all handling being bound to take place manually. According to the invention it is possible to modify these units for automatic on-line operation, and it is an important aspect of the invention that the units in question are not just modified laboratory units in general, but modified factual standard units owned by users desiring to change into automatic sample handling and analysing. The reason for this is that such a user will already have spent considerable amounts for achieving a good calibration of the measuring apparatus, this requiring a high number of expensive chemical analyses, and the detailed calibration base will be inseparapbly associat¬ ed with the individual apparatus. For this reason it is highly advantageous that it is the already owned apparatus which is being modified, and it has been found permissible to move the associated optical head to a different apparatus unit in order to make an automatic sample handling possible. Similar circumstances apply to the grinding mill, though less marked. If strictly required the mill may be replaced by another mill, but only of just the same brand and type, because the accuracy of the analysis results is closely depending on the samples being prepared in just the same manner as when the calibrat¬ ions were made. With the use of the relatively inexpensive laboratory mills it is possible to handle materials with a coarseness up to about pea size. With the invention it has been found possible to work with sample portions considerably smaller than the approximately four liters as specified in the said WO/89/11090, viz. just some 200- 300 ml. The samples may well be supplied from external samplers or sample terminals via pneumatic conveying, and owing to their small volume and the - admittedly - limited capacity of the system it will normally be acceptable to just scrap the samples after- wards, without returning them. If with a given user still coarser materials are to be handled, it will be required to pre-prepare these materials by comminution to the fineness required for an effective milling in the aforementioned grinding mill. This can be arranged in the conventional manual manner with the use of a suitable chopping machine, but accord¬ ing to the invention it will also be possible to arrange this chopping unit as an on-line module in operative connection with the basic system as consisting of the mill and the analyser. As in WO/89/11090 this module may be connected with various automatic samplers and sample terminals, and in such systems it should be preferred to work with sample portions of the magnitude four liters. The module in question may then comprise a. divider that will send the smaller sample of e.g. 250 ml to the said basic system, while the major part of the sample, 3.75 1, may be returned or scrapped. The basic system may be supplemented by a receiver unit for the analysed samples, which unit may easily be adapted so as to distinguish between sample refuse to be scrapped and sample portions which, analysingwise, are more interesting, such that they should be collected in cups for further reference analysis. The invention, which is defined in more detail in the claims, will now be further explained with reference to the drawing, in which: Fig. 1 is a schematic diagram of a system according to the invention, Fig. 2 is a sectional view of a grinding mill therein, Fig. 3 is a perspective view of an associated NIR analyzer,3 Figs. 4-6 are other views thereof, and Fig 7 is a perspective view of a sample discharge station in the system. The system shown in Fig. 1 is basically divided in sections A,B,C and D, and it is section A which is the basic module in the system, as with this module the user can switch from manual laboratory handling of arriving samples to a fully automatic handling thereof, even with a maintained calibration of a previously used analysing unit based on the NIR principle or principles comparable thereto. An already existing NIR analyser 2 is retained, but its optical head 4 is taken out and mounted in a cabinet 6, which is movable relative to a test chamber 8 as described below. This chamber receives comminuted sample material from a mill 10, the material passing a cyclone 12 and then a homogeniser 14. After the analysis the samples are let out through a bottom outlet 16 of the chamber 8, optionally to the module D, which is describ¬ ed in more detail below. The mill 10 can be supplied with test material from a receiver terminal 18, from which the material is supplied through a conduit 20, driven by the suction of a suction fan 22, which, in section A, draws conveying air from the mill 10 to the cyclone 12. However, the supply conduit 20 may also be connected to external samplers or terminals 24 in section C as well as to a discharge conduit 26 from section B. If applicable, the mill 10 may be a previously used laboratory mill, which is then only modified according to the invention, this being illustrated in Fig. 2. Such a mill will typically have a lower motor housing 28 with a central top mounting 30 having along its periphery an upstanding annular screen 32, the inner side of which is swept by a knife rotor 34. A tray member 36 surrounds the screen 32 and is closable, in the original design, by a cover not shown. According to the invention the tray 36 is replaced or filled out by an annular body 38, shown in hatching, which is made with a tangential out¬ let 40 and cross sectionally shaped with an evenly curv- ed inner wall 42. This insert body is at more places provided with compressed air nozzles 44, enabling a widely effective cleaning of the chamber after each passage of a sample. A supplied sample and rests thereof blown off from the mill 10 will be conveyed, suitably comminuted, via the cyclone 12 to the homogeniser 14. The latter serves the same purpose as the unit designated 5 in Fig. 4 of W089/09388, viz. to homogenize the received material. In the present connection, however, a different unit is used, viz. an apparatus working according to a known principle as a real mixing unit, but here being used only for self-mixing of the successively supplied samples. It has been found that it is then possible to avoid the use of the special measuring homogeniser which according to the WO publication is provided inside the test chamber and denoted 36,38. Because the said mixing unit is of a known type, it should here only be briefly described. According to Fig. 4 it comprises a horizontal cylindrical housing 50 accomodating a rotor 52, which consists of an outer worm winding 54 with a conveying pitch in one direction and an inner worm winding with a pitch in the opposite axial direction. It is known that more materials fed to the top of the rotor housing 50 can hereby be effectively mixed, but according to the invention also a very effective sample homogenising of only a single material can be achieved. In connection with the invention the said known mixing principle will provide not only for a good homogenising of the received single material, but also - as generally aimed at in the system - for a relatively small contact area between the material and the respective working units, such that the risk of sample contamination from previous samples can be kept as low as possible. From the fine homogeniser 14 the discharge material is fed down into the very analysing unit 6,8, which, in principle, may be designed just as disclosed in the said WO publication. It should be mentioned, however, that in connection with the invention it has been found possible to simplify also this part of the entire system, so as to obviate the use of a complicated and operatively expensive feeding of a separation film between the sensor head of the analyser and the sample material, viz. by effecting a cleaning of the sensor head by blow¬ ing, wiping or ionizing of this head, which in a NIR based system will exhibit a cover disk of quartz glass, and it is sufficient to clean the outside of this disk between the analysings of the successive sample portions. A wiping can be effected with a moving clean¬ ing web laid about a roller which is moved along the outside of the quartz glass, such that the wiping will take place in a progressive and concentrated manner As mentioned, but not shown in more detail, there are mounted, at all qualified places in the system, air nozzles for interior cleaning flushing of the different units. The numeral 11 denotes a connection by-passing the mill for supplying products not requiring to be milled. With the invention it is a basic consideration that the use of the mixing unit 14 as shown in Figs, l and 4, downstream of the cyclone 12, a high degree of homogeni- sation of the treated samples will be achieved, such that each of the samples, when dumped into the underly¬ ing test chamber 8, will remain sufficiently homogenous for the analysing measurements to be correct. For the same reason, however, it is preferred that the measuring window in the test chamber be relatively large, viz. so much larger than the required measuring area that there is area enough for making separate tests on two or more different areas of the window, e.g. as illustrated in Fig. 6, it being possible to effect a successive shift of the sensor head, designated 60, relative to the test chamber. If in this way e.g. four measurements are made at different places of one single sample, a represent¬ ative average result can be obtained, and the associated data processor may be adapted to trigger an alarm, if the spreading between the single measuring results is unacceptably high, indicating that the ho ogenisation is not good enough. If so, it can be chosen to repeat the test with a new sample of the same material, or to take out the sample for chemical analysis. Hence, when the test window, 62, is thus wanted to be relatively large, the test chamber will have to be correspondingly high and broad. With sample portions of the magnitude 250 ml the chamber then has to be so thin, see Figs. 3 and 4, that it will be thinner than the outlet opening beneath the homogeniser 14. In order to counteract a separation in the sample material it is desirable that the entire sample be dumped at one time into the test chamber 8, and this may take place by a sudden retraction of a valve plate 64 at the said outlet from the homogeniser 14. Due to the smaller thickness of the chamber 8, there has to be a certain narrowing 66 downwardly, and it will be noted that this narrowing is located above the chamber side opposite the test window 62, the reason for this being that the dumping of the material next to this window should preferably be as direct and undisturbed as possible. In the analyser equipment as shown in Figs. 3-6 it is chosen to let the said measuring window 62 be a regular hole in the wall of the test chamber 8, while the associated window glass, designated 68, is mounted on the apparatus cabinet 6 containing the measuring optics 4 for effecting the analyses. Inside this unit the optical head 4 is mounted in such a manner that it can be moved between the four different positions shown in Fig. 6. In addition, the whole cabinet 6 is movable, in being mounted on a support 72, on which it is displaceable by means of a cylinder 70, while the support 72 is transversely displaceable by means of a cylinder 74. Thereby it will be possible to move the cabinet 6 in Fig. 3 a distance to the left and there¬ after forwardly against the test chamber, until the window 68 seals over the hole in the wall of the test chamber, which can thereafter receive a sample to be analysed. Upon the dumping of the prepared sample portion from the chamber 14 to the test chamber 8 there is arranged, by means of a cylinder 76, a projection of a piston plate 78 from the rear side of the chamber 8, where this plate is housed in a housing portion 80, such that the sample material adjacent the window 68 is compacted against this window. During the analysing process the sample material should be kept absolutely undisturbed, and it is preferred, therefore, to arrest the piston plate 78 firmly in its projecting position, this being done by means of a crosswise arranged pressure cylinder 82 on the piston cylinder 76. When the analysis has been made, i.e. when measure¬ ments have been made with the measuring head in the respective four positions according to Fig. 6, the piston plate 78 is retracted into the housing part 80, and the discharge pipe 16 is connected with a suction fan for sucking out the sample, preferably a suction fan 84 in the discharge section D, which fan may well be an ordinary vacuum cleaner. Thereby the test chamber will be emptied from below. After the emptying of the test chamber an important method step is taken, which is not further illustrated, viz. a blowing in of compressed air through air nozzles in or against strategic places in the entire system 14,8, so as to achieve an effective cleaning of the surfaces having been in contact with the test material. It should be stressed that in addition to stationary nozzles one or more nozzles may be mounted in connection with the driving shaft of the rotor in the homogeniser 14. Another measure will be to arrange for an extra powerful air sweeping of the window glass 68, as the material has been positively pressed thereagainst.The same could apply to the piston plate 78, but for NIR analyses this will be less critical, because small remnants on this plate will not effectively contaminate the subsequent sample. However, if the analysis is based on a transillumination of the test chamber, i.e. where also the said plate is translucent, this plate should of course also have to be effectively cleaned. After this cleaning it could be possible to continue with the next sample, given that a relevant accuracy standard for the analysis of the next sample can be observed. However, this will be possible only exceptionally, as it will normally be required to ensure an extra good cleaning of the window glass 68. It is primarily for this reason, the analyser 6 is mounted in a movable manner, as it will then be possible to expose the window for an external and more effective cleaning thereof. For effecting this cleaning there is mounted, next to the test chamber 8, a separate, box-shaped unit 86, see particularly Figs 4 and 5, having at its front side a projecting roller 88 acting as a sprocket roller for a cleaning web 90, which is reeled off from a supply reel 92 and is reeled onto a reel driven by a stepmotor 95, Fig. 4. The cleaning web 90 may be a non-expensive, impregnated paper or textile web, which, for each operation, will only have to be advanced as far or rather short that it will expose a clean web portion on the roller 88. With the said movability of the analyser 6 it will be possible to move this unit such that its window member 68 is brought to scrape over the roller 88, whereby remaining sample rests will be cleaned of effectively. Normally, it will not be required to advance the cleaning web during this operation, as the web will be smudged very little during this operation. Some trace of impregnation agent may be left on the window, and if this would affect the result of the next analysis, the window will have to be dried or wiped before it is brought in renewed operative connection with the window hole 62, this being possible by moving the window past special air nozzles or past a wipe unit that may fully correspond to the unit 86. In the system is also arranged a special measuring plate 98, see Figs. 4 and 5, which the window member 68 on the analyser unit 6 may be brought to contact by a suitable moving of this unit. The plate 98 is of ceramics which, when subjected to an analysing measure¬ ment, will provide known reference results, whereby it can be checked whether the cleaning and the operation of the measuring equipment is correct. In the discharge section D the sample material is sucked to a cyclone 100, from which it can be delivered to a cup 108 on a conveyor 110, see Fig. 7. Alternative¬ ly, by means of a switch over valve 102 the material may be fed to a cyclone 104, from which it is discharged to be scrapped. A controller computer may provoke an empty¬ ing into a cup 108 when an analysis result is found so peculiar that a subsequent laboratory analysis of the sample can be relevant. Suitably, therefore, this part of the system may be mounted directly at or in a laboratory, possibly at large spacing from the cyclone 104. The module B, Fig. 1, is a coarse milling unit containing a knife mill 112 and a suction fan 114 for sucking the sample material to this mill and further sucking the product to a cyclone 116, which, via a dis- charge unit 118, will deliver the product to a divider 120. It is preferred to feed the module B with sample portions of approximately 4 1, and the divider 120 should deliver approximately 250 ml to the module A through the conduit 26, i.e. for each sample the divider will deliver some 3.75 1 through a discharge conduit 122, from which the material may optionally be returned to the relevant source, e.g. a silo. A suction conduit 124 to the mill 112 in module B may be connected with a local sample receiver 126, but also here it is a possibility that the conduit can be connected with various automatic samplers or external sample terminals in the system designated C. In addition to the said cleaning by means of compressed air at strategic places in the system, in order to keep the system clean the various parts there¬ of, particularly the mill 10 and the cyclone 12, should be kept heated somewhat, as this will counteract condensation of sample material on the inner sides.

Claims: C L A I M S : 1. A system for on-line analysing of material samples, comprising an analyser unit based on the NIR principle or a corresponding optical analysing method and, upstream of that unit, a grinding mill for comminuting the sample material fed to the analyser unit, characterised in that the mill is designed so as to self emptying and self cleaning and that the analys¬ ing unit is divided in a first housing, which holds the optical system of the unit and is movably arranged relative to a receiving chamber for discharge material from the mill, and a second housing holding the remain¬ ing parts of this unit, the first housing being movable between a working position, in which a front glass of the optical system closes a wall opening in the receiver chamber, and a cleaning position, in which the front glass cooperates with means for cleaning the glass. 2. A system according to claim 1, characterized in that the cleaning means comprise a diversion edge or roller for an impregnated cleaning web, projecting from a cleaning housing having driving means for advancing this web and being movable relative said first housing for effecting a scraping movement of the projecting part of the cleaning web over said front glass. 3. A system according to claim 1, characterized in that the optical system in the first housing is mounted in such a shiftable manner behind the front glass that for each operation it is shiftable between two or more operative positions, which are mutually entirely or substantially non-overlapping. 4. A system according to claim 1, characterized in that the receiving chamber is dimensioned for receiving successive sample portions of the magnitude 200-500 ml. 5. A system according to claim 1, characterized in that above the the receiving chamber there is provided a homogenisation mixer for the material supplied from the mill, preferably a cylindrical mixing device of the double screw type. 6. A system according to claim 1, characterized in that the mill is constituted by a modified laboratory mill , provided with insert portions for forming around the screen an annular channel having a cross sectionally rounded outer wall and a tangential outlet, said insert portions being provided with inlets for compressed air and preferably also with heating means. 7. A system according to claim 1, characterized in that it is constructed as a modular unit (A) and is connected with another modular unit (B) , which holds a mill for comminution of coarse material and a divider for out-separating a portion of the discharge product and delivering this portion to the first modular unit, viz. preferably a portion amounting to 1/10 - 1/25 of the sample portion treated by the mill. 8. A system according to claim 7 and further connected with external samplers or sample terminals, characterized in that these are connected to the respective modular units all according to the coarseness of the associated materials, and that samplers for material to the first modular unit (a) are designed to operated with sample portions that are considerably smaller than the sample portions for the other modular unit (b) . 9. A system according to claim 1, characterized in that it is discharge connected with a discharging unit (D) , which is operable to selectively deliver the relatively small sample portions to a scrap container or to test cups, respectively. 10. A method of establishing a system according to claim 1, characterized in that an already existing, operative analyser is modified for the purpose and taken in use, preferably together with an associated grinding mill according to claim 6, the already existing calibration of the analyser preferably being maintained.

Inventors: BJERRE MICHAEL, HEINRICHSON JENS, JOHNSEN ERIK, BJERRE, MICHAEL, HEINRICHSON, JENS, JOHNSEN, ERIK
Applicants: BJERRE MICHAEL, HEINRICHSON JENS, JESMA MATADOR AS, JOHNSEN ERIK, JESMA-MATADOR A/S
Application year: 1993
Main classification: G01N1
IPC codes: G01N1, G01N21, G01N33, G01N35