Recycling of clarifier underflow to the diffuser at Lautoka Mill.

For the 2002 season, the entire juice clarifier underflow stream has been diverted to the De Smet cane diffuser. In previous seasons, the cane entering Lautoka Mill went to a milling train and the diffuser. For the 2002 season, alterations were made to allow the diffuser to take all the cane entering the factory. It was thought that, in view of this new situation and the relatively clean state of the cane entering the Lautoka Mill, the opportunity existed to eliminate the filter station similar to what has been done at many factories in South Africa. The rationale behind this was based on the savings in eliminating the filter station and the need to remove filter cake from the factory and find sites to dump it. This paper describes the system set up to handle the mud stream and sets out the problems encountered in getting this system running and the alterations planned to enhance the system. The paper also looks at the diffuser losses for 2002 season compared with the combined mud and bagasse losses of previous seasons.