3. Practical questions about defoamers and defoaming agents
3.1 Why add solid particles to formulations?
Oils alone are capable of destroying foam, but if microscopic particles are dispersed in the oil, the antifoam's effectiveness improves significantly. The improvement comes from the effect the particles have on the first stage of the antifoam's action process, droplet entry at the air/solution interface. The effect is similar to that of a needle breaking a membrane, as shown in figure 1 . The forces are concentrated at the tip of the needle, rather than being distributed across the entire film interface. As a result, the particles present "puncture" the aqueous film, which prevents the oil from penetrating the air/solution interface. The oil...
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Practical questions about defoamers and defoaming agents
Conclusion
Economic aspects
The defoamer market is both very large and highly segmented, and it's virtually impossible to obtain information on its precise size. There are too many producers and too many situations to deal with. The most recent European production figures are 12,000 tonnes a year of silicone oil-based antifoams and 18,000 tonnes a year of hydrocarbon-based antifoams.
Producers differ both in their orientations...
Bibliography
General works
Suppliers
(non-exhaustive list)
Defoamers and defoamers
A non-exhaustive list is given in table 1 . Among these, let's mention the main ones:
Rhodia-silicones http://www.rhodia-silicones.com
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