Waste water reclamation in fiber glass operation

Claim 3

In the manufacture of fiber glass insulation product wherein fibers are attenuated by hot gases, sprayed with a phenolic binder and collected on a mat forming Chain, and wherein the chain is continuously cleaned with water to remove binder therefrom before reuse in collecting fibers the improvement comprising, subjecting the chain to a low pressure water spray, immersing the chain after said spray in a soft water bath having a continuous supply of soft water fed thereto, subjecting the chain to a second spray at high pressure and returning the chain to a forming area for the collection of glass fibers thereon, recovering the spent water from both spraying zones and overflow water from the immersion zone in a collection zone, feeding water from the collection zone to a solids-liquid separation zone, removing suspended solids from the water in the solids-liquid separation zone and passing a portion of the resulting water to the said high pressure spray and the said low pressure spray, passing the remaining portion of the water to a chemical treatment zone, treating the water in the chemical treatment zone with a high molecular weight cationic polymer to flocculate unusable phenolic binder content thereof, filtering the flocculant so produced from the water to recover water containing substantially all usable phenolic binder and utilizing this water to prepare phenolic binder for use in coating fiber glass during manufacture.

Claim 4

In the manufacture of fiber glass insulation product wherein glass fibers are coated with a phenolic binder and formed into a mat on a mat forming chain and wherein the chain is continuously cleaned with water to remove binder therefrom before reuse in collecting fibers the improvement comprising subjecting the chain to a soft water wash during the cleaning cycle, collecting all the waste water from the cleaning cycle, introducing the water collected to a liquid-solids separation zone, removing the solids from the water to produce a water stream having a substantially reduced solids content, using a portion of this stream in the cleaning cycle to wash the chain, feeding the remainder of the water to a chemical treatment zone, introducing a high molecular weight cationic polymer to said chemical treatment zone in a quantity sufficient to flocculate the unusable phenolic binder present in said water, filtering the resulting flocculated water to remove the flocs and introducing the resulting water stream to a binder mixing tank to provide water for the preparation of phenolic binder for the glass fiber manufacturing operation.