What is a Bake-Out, and Why Is It Necessary?

Field service and maintenance on pollution control equipment can be complicated. GCES prides itself on having one of the most capable teams of service experts in the field service, with over 75 combined years of industry specific experience. Our team understands the importance of a customer understanding their equipment’s specific needs. In their continuing commitment to extending the life of pollution control equipment for GCES customers, they regularly provide maintenance tips, based on their real-world experience.

A bake-out is a maintenance function that must be performed on a Regenerative Thermal Oxidizer, in order to clean the media bed. The bed of the RTO accumulates process specific aerosols and particulates over time, which can cause alter the unit’s ability to function as it was designed to. Efficiency, capacity, and reliability of the unit may be compromised, if the ceramic media beds performance is inhibited. If left unclean for a prolonged period, the risks of fire, and total shutdown may become more prevalent.

A bake-out involves heating the ceramic media beds to a predetermined, extremely high temperature, in order to burn off all the accumulates. Temperatures may vary, depending on the design of the equipment. This area of the RTO can be difficult to manually access, so a bake-out is the most efficient way to remove and destroy these particulates. Think of it like the “self-cleaning” button on your kitchen oven. [Read more…]