Kombucha is a fermented drink made from black tea. It started in China around 200 BC and was thought
to have healing properties. A couple of thousand years later and people are still drinking it for
the health benefits, but our video isn't about making kombucha. It's about filtration. Let's head
into the lab and I'll explain. Always be sure to wear your PPE - lab coat, gloves and safety glasses .
This is our plate and frame filtration unit. It's actually designed for clarifying wine,
but it works like the filtration systems used in the pharma industry. We're going to demo the system
using kombucha. Kombucha is a cloudy suspension and it contains a layer of bacteria and yeast called
scoby. We can use the filtration unit to remove the scoby and leave us with a clear liquid.
Here's how the system works. The gear pump pulls up the fluid and pushes it into a set of plates .
The plates hold filter pads. The liquid passes through but the solids stick to the filters.
Unwrap three of the filter pads and soak them for about a minute in a clean tray of water. While
they're soaking, let's set up the plate and frame filtration unit. Attach the hose to the fitting
located under the drip tray. Run the tube into a waste container. Remove the two black hand wheels.
Remove the three central plates. Take the pads out of the water and place them into the filter
body starting with the back one first. The pads have a smooth side and a coarse side.
The coarse side of each pad should face you when placing them in the unit. Align the guide holes,
and tighten the hand wheels - alternating each side so that the pads stay balanced.
Connect the short tube that connects the pump to the first filtering plate.
Connect the intake hose to the inlet pump valve. Insert the outtake tube into the exit nozzle.
Let's test the system for leaks. Place the intake hose into a container with at least one liter of
deionized water. Place the outtake tube into a clean collection container and start the
unit to run the filtration cycle. Check the pads and snug the hand wheels if there are any leaks.
Pour the kombucha into a beaker with a magnetic stir bar and place it on a stir plate.
Insert the intake hose. It's the one with the anti-sediment tip which helps keep the tube from
getting clogged. Put the tip into the bottom of the beaker without bumping into the stir bar. Place the
outtake tube into a clean collection container and start the unit to run the filtration cycle.
Take a look at the results. Remember what the kombucha looked like before?
Now it's much clearer. The filter pads did the trick. Record the results in your lab
notebook. Now let's clean the system. Remove the tube from the fitting under the drip tray.
Disconnect the short tube which leads from the pump to the first filtering plate.
Attach the drip tray tube to the outlet portion of the pump leaving the intake tube connected to
the pump. You now have a direct line through the pump that bypasses the filtering plates.
Place the intake tube into a container of clean water and the outtake tube into an empty container.
Turn on the pump to flush it out. Remove the tubes and set aside to be cleaned. Lastly, disassemble the
filtering plates and discard the pads. You can see how much of the kombucha the filter pad's removed.
Clean the unit using warm soapy water. Clean the tubing with isopropyl alcohol.
So that's plate and frame filtration. It works for kombucha, but we also use the same method
to filter biotech products in industry... just on a larger scale. Thanks for watching.