For twenty eight years Particle technology laboratory in chemical engineering department of IIT Delhi is interacting with Indian industry to demonstrate the application of particle technology in powder processing. It was possible to achieve visible success due to help and interaction from universities in Europe such as TU Karlsruhe, TU Braunsweig , TU Erlangen in Germany and TU Delft in The Netherlands. Short courses were conducted for various industries the application of theoretical equations and use of CFD in retrofitting existing industrial equipments for better performance.

The industrial interaction started with need of the industry. The first attempt was with retrofitting of existing cyclones and design of new cyclones. Cyclones have been used in industries mostly for dust collection. Design is mostly empirical. Most of the bag filter is preceded by cyclone and not much effort is put to improve performance of cyclones.

The cyclone is used as Heat exchanger in cement industries for pre heating of raw material with hot air from cooler. Cyclones has been developed to use in air cleaning for clean room . Cyclones of efficiency up to 99.7% efficiency and pressure drop of 45 mm were developed for industrial application to handle air flow rate of 0.6 million cu.m/hr at 300 oC to for the following operations in addition to the dust collection.

An effort has been made to reduce the load on bag filter attached to cyclone in the mill circuit. It helped to produce finer and steady product. Cyclones have been developed to clean air for the engine intake system for large heavy vehicles as well as automobiles helping in reducing the fuel consumption in the automobiles.

Low-pressure cyclones were developed with the support from industrial projects. Pipe cyclones were developed with industrial interaction for fugitive dust collection. The paper will describe the use of cyclone as dust collector, heat exchanger and classifier.

The industrial interaction with cyclones has helped to bring awareness in industry on characterisation of powders in particular the need for shape characterisation. Many of the products have been improved by controlling shape of particles. The importance of estimation of flow properties for silo design is realized. The need to understand fluid particle interaction for selection of good filter fabric and use Comminution theory to control and reduce specific energy consumption has been understood by industries through this interaction. Recently pharmaceutical industries have realized the importance of particle technology for production of better products.