Passivation Equipment & Ultrasonic Passivation Systems for Stainless Steel with Nitric / Citric Acid

Best Technology is the industry’s leading supplier of passivation equipment and passivation systems for passivating stainless steel. These systems include: benchtop ultrasonic cleaner equipment, wet bench passivation equipment, ultrasonic automated passivation systems, and agitated immersion multi-tank passivation systems. Every passivation system and piece of passivation equipment built is designed around customer-specific application and industry specifications to ensure equipment allows repeatable, stable passivation of stainless steel that is easily validated to regulatory and industry requirements.

Types of Passivation Systems for Every Application and Part Size:

Bench Top Ultrasonic Passivation Equipment

Our multi-tank ultrasonic passivation system combined with our hot air dryer make an effective passivation line by housing heated cleaning solution, cascading DI rinse water, citric or nitric acid passivation solution, and a final cascading DI rinse water with a final hot air drying step.

Ultrasonic Passivation Consoles

Our multi-tank ultrasonic passivation systems are also available as console units. With a console system, the bench is built-in. And the casters on our console systems make them portable, so they can be wheeled from one manufacturing cell to another if needed. Console systems allow for a wide range of custom sizes for a custom all-in-one passivation system tailored to the specific application.

Automated Ultrasonic Passivation Systems

Our automated ultrasonic nitric or citric acid passivation systems clean, rinse, passivate, rinse and dry by moving the fluids from heated storage tanks into a single ultrasonic process tank, rather than moving the parts basket through a series of tanks. Modular heated storage tanks complete the system for re-use of detergents and rinse water. This system configuration eliminates operator interaction, variability and eliminates exposure to chemicals.  This unique system design can save up to 50% of passivation equipment cost vs. traditional mulit-tank setups with overhead index automation/robotics.

Small Automated Ultrasonic Passivation Equipment

The small 3.5 gallon benchtop automated ultrasonic passivation system (nitric or citric acid) is an ideal fit for passivating small stainless steel parts in cellular manufacturing environments such as medical device manufacturing, aerospace manufacturing, machine shops and job shops.

Dual Processing Automated Passivation Systems

For manufacturing processes which require higher throughput or lower cycle times, the dual processing automated passivation system allows for the same machine design concept but 2 processing units sharing the same storage tanks which effectively doubles the system throughput without needing to purchase a completely new passivation system.

Fume Hoods for Citric / Nitric Acid Passivation

For wet chemical processing applications which require complex combinations of chemistries, heavy ventilation and containment, the passivation wet bench equipment is used for citric / nitric acid passivation of stainless steel, titanium and other metal parts. Typical construction materials include polypropylene, stainless steel, PVDF, PVC-C and others depending on the chemical handling properties required for the application.

Agitated Immersion Passivation System

Agitated immersion parts passivation systems and dip tank parts washers use a simple yet rugged designed pneumatically powered reciprocating platform to agitate parts in the water, solvent-based detergent or passivation acid.  This action coupled with options like ultrasonics, high flow filtration & pump turbulation, and oil removal systems ensure all true oil and particulate are removed from not only the outside of your parts but also the internal cavities/passages that other types of parts washing systems can’t properly clean. Once clean, the same process is performed with nitric or citric acid to passivate parts.

Common Applications and Specifications for Passivation Equipment

• Nitric acid passivation type 2, 3, 4 ASTM A967
• Citric acid passivation type 1, 2, 3, 4, & 5 ASTM A967 using Stellar Solution’s Citrisurf®
• Passivation Specifications: ASTM A380 – Practice for Cleaning, Descaling and Passivating of Stainless Steel Parts, Equipment and Systems, ASTM A967 – Specification for Chemical Passivation Treatments for Stainless Steel Parts (based on US Defense Department standard QQ-P-35C) – one of the most common passivation specifications, AMS 2700 – Passivation of Corrosion Resistant Steels, AMS-QQ-P-35 – Passivation Treatments for Corrosion-Resistant Steel, ASTM F86 – Standard Practice for Surface Preparation and Marking of Metallic Surgical Implants
• Cleaning and passivating of parts with lots of internal passageways like casting and cylinder blocks
• Medical and aerospace parts which require critical cleaning requirements

Applicable Passivation Process Case Studies

• Automated Ultrasonic Passivation System for Medical Device and General Parts
• Manual Benchtop Ultrasonic Citric Acid Passivation System
• Medical Device Guidewire Automated Ultrasonic Cleaning and Passivation System
• Medical Device Cleaning and Passivating Equipment with a Cleanroom Space Constraint
• Heated Polypropylene Acid Passivation and Rinse Tanks
• Automated 6-Stage Wash-Rinse-Passivate-Rinse-Rinse-Dry For Aerospace Customer
• Automated Pipe Cleaning and Acid Passivation System
• Semi-Automated Inline Citric Passivation Solution with Data Tracking

FAQ Automated Cleaning and Passivation Systems

CitriSurf is a registered trademark of Stellar Solutions, Inc.