🎧Seeing clearly with Filtermist

As a leading manufacturer of steel windows, Crittall Windows manufactures bespoke windows, doors and screens that range from residential and commercial applications to architecturally significant historical buildings. With a history that dates back to 1849, the Essex company applies the latest manufacturing technologies. In the new machining department, the FX Series of compact oil mist collection systems from Filtermist has made a dramatic impact.

Crittall’s fascinating history includes producing windows for the fateful Titanic, munitions during World War 1 and prefabricated truss bridges for World War 2.
The Witham-based manufacturer has implemented a series of modernisation strategies to upgrade its machining division. Discussing this, Darren Joyce, Production Director at Crittall Windows says: “We cut the steel, machine it, weld it, galvanise it, powder coat and ship our products around the world. We are having a transitional period to more modern and flexible CNC machining to deal with one-offs a lot easier.”
One issue the company recognised from transitioning to CNC machining was coolant mist and fumes from the machine tools. This is where Filtermist stepped in. Darren continues: “Machining needs a lot of coolant and this gave us an issue with fumes. We rapidly found the factory starting to mist up. This wasn’t a good workplace environment and there was far too much coolant on our parts which are being welded further downstream –creating even more fumes.”

“We wanted to revise the way we work with coolant and cutting fluid on our machines. We needed to find something that would take the oil out of the air. If we could take the oil out of the air inside the machines, then when the machine doors open, you don’t get puffs of oil-laden air.”

Alluding to how the company started working with Filtermist, Darren recalls: “We did a lot of investigation work and we spoke to a lot of machinery manufacturers, which brought us to Filtermist. Filtermist effectively manufacture what is a drum that centrifugally spins and removes the oil out of the air and filters it out. We have now installed them in all of our CNC machining centres. The Filtermist FX5002 unit successfully spins the oil out of the air, but we have modified further, so we are recycling the oil and using it on our flood-based coolant machines, extending the service life of the oil.”

Crittall has gone from not knowing the Filtermist brand to having 12 of its FX5002 units installed in less than a year. Furthermore, Crittall has specified the Filtermist units with an F Monitor 2 that gives customers live readings of the Filtermist systems’ efficiency level.

Commenting upon the evident changes to the working environment at Crittall, Darren continues: “Not long after installation, we could see the difference. We could see the mist clouds dissipating. The health & safety and well-being of employees have always been our number one priority. In a steel window plant where you also have welding operations and pre-treatment processes, there are evidently fumes, so we have large extraction facilities to manage this. However, the localised filtration of oil out of the air was so important – its where we have seen the biggest improvement.”

Of course, the Filtermist systems can add so much more than an improvement to the working environment. Commenting upon this, Darren concludes: “We have also found economic benefits from the Filtermist systems. We take the oil from the Filtermist systems, recycle and use it on other machines – coolants and cutting fluids are not cheap, especially as we have moved to a water-based coolant as opposed to an oil-based coolant. We have also cut down on our oil consumption and expenses. Additionally, the Filtermist filters are cutting in and out to coordinate with our machine usage as opposed to constantly running like extraction units, so we are also seeing energy savings. All of this really does make the Filtermist extraction systems a ‘no-brainer’.”