Vacuum Pump Gas Ballast Operation

This video explains the use of a gas ballast on a rotary vane vacuum pump to remove volatiles from the oil used for sealing the pump.

[rex-upln]

My organic synthesis lab (newly setup) bought two edwards rv3. We used one for rotovap, another for drying samples. Nobody told us we must use a cold trap. Both pumps got damaged within a month. Technician removed about 200 grams of what appeared to be gunk along with some nicely crystallized stuff from the insides of one pump.

[GnosisMan]

thank you for sharing your video. I have a question: When you have the ballast set to zero and you let it run to remove volatiles, how long should you let it run at zero and what is the difference when running the pump at 1 or 2?

[RajasekarRamu-pqbf]

Smoke coming continued any issue..pls suggestions?

[dimkoz]

I have a Pfeiffer duo 10. Using it for freeze drying. I have option 0 and 1. When using this to make food grade product, which option do i want? Thanks in advance!

[disgraziato]

Hello - good video. I have an Edwards D40B vacuum pump. We exhaust our ballast directly to a fume hood to reduce the odour. The distance is long, and I think residual off gas is coming back into the oil and decreasing its life. Do you have any suggestions as to how I can prevent odour and at the same time increase the longevity of our oil? I was thinking of using a trap of some sort?

[albertrios]

We are using a Pfeiffer Duo 3 for a Scanning Electron Microscope. we only look at solid items. Should I keep the ballast open at 1 or closed? (ours shows 0 or 1). Or should I have it open until a specific vacuum range is achieved and then close it? Thank you.

[zachreyhelmberger]

Oh wonderful! So I do not have to have a source of compressed gas to inject into the gas ballast port?!
I have a HarvestRight freeze dryer and on the side of the pump, there is a knurled knob that says "gas ballast ON OFF" in the documentation, it is called part number 46 "knob". So if I loosen that knob, it looks like it can come completely off, which I assume is not a good thing. So from finger tight, I should rotate it counter-clockwise 360 degrees or so, right?