To develop Eco-Valve, examining and understanding the functionality of existing aerosols on the market formed a key part of our research at Salvalco.
Current LPG propellants release tremendous energy when they flash-vaporise on leaving the pressurised packaging, which means that fine atomisation of the product is easy and gives a near constant product flow rate.
By contrast, other safe compressed gas propellants, e.g. air or nitrogen, provide relatively little atomisation energy when used with conventional valves and the power available reduces as the can empties. This tends to result in a dramatic drop off in spray performance in terms of reduced flow rate and increased particle size as the can empties.
By understanding the functionality of existing valves, we were keen to develop a solution that would provide the same performance. As such the University of Salford (UoS) Spray Research Group (SRG) project was designed to develop a system which would enable an aerosol to be propelled by inert gases but to offer spray performance similar to LPG propelled products and to overcome the problems of drop off in spray performance. It’s this research by the SRG, guided by the leadership of Professor Ghasem Nasr that has led to the development of Salvalco Eco-Valve.