Experimental study of Efficiency Improvement of API Oil-water Separator Using Disk Oil Skimmer

The aim of this research is to investigate the effect of using disk oil skimmer in the water treatment units of refineries and to evaluate the performance and efficiency of these types of oil removers. Due to the lack of sufficient information on the design and construction of this equipment, an experimental prototype needed to be manufactured. Such a prototype has been constructed in Pars oil refinery to simulate and investigate the efficiency of oil disk skimmer. It was subjecte to different tests in order to study parameters such as disk material, oil temperature, optimum disk rotation and the distance of disk form rear barrier. The results indicate that aluminum disk with 12 rpm has higher efficiency and the more distance from rear barrier, the higher efficiency yields. Finally the use of disk oil skimmer is strongly recommended; although more research is needed for the design and fabrication of industrial-scale