AM-98-49 NEW DEVELOPMENTS IN THE MEASUREMENT OF OIL CONTENT IN WAXES USING BENCHTOP PULSED NMR

Description:

Traditional methods (ASTM and IP) [ref 1,2,3] for oil content analysis involve solvent extraction of the wax and gravimetric determination of the residue. The procedures suffer from several acute disadvantages. The analysis time is long and labour intensive, flammable solvents are required, and the analytical result is regarded as operator dependent because of the level of skill involved in accurate analysis. Also, it is very difficult to measure the oil content of microcrystalline waxes using the ASTM methods. Indications of industry trends for the next few years, primarily in the US, [ref 41 , suggest a growing requirement for cost savings in wax production and quality control in order to maintain a competitive position. A rapid method for oil content analysis with low operator workload and low consumables costs provides one means by which some of the required improvements in efficiency can be achieved.