Argo Tractors places emphasis on the environment. Safeguarding the environment has become a crucial issue in many industries and the Italian multinational based in Fabbrico has substantiated its environmental awareness by boosting its investment in this area.

Action taken by Argo Tractors in this area includes the so-called Water Wall system installed in 2010 that dramatically cuts the amount of oils used thanks to a regeneration process that removes foreign oils and prevents the development of oil mists to keep the workplace healthy and safe and reduce the amount of spent cooling lubricants that need to be disposed of.

This system requires no chemical additives and is employed in the Machining Department of the Fabbrico plant, with its 35 machining centres operating 24 hours per day. Basically, the system recovers and regenerates the emulsion used when milling and drilling the various cast-iron and steel component parts for Landini, McCormick and Valpadana tractors.

The cooling lubricant flowing in a closed-loop piping system is first used in the machining centres and then conveyed into settling tanks where the metal filings from the machining processes are removed. Finally, the same system decontaminates the fluid removing any fungi or bacteria that may have grown in the different systems. When the treatment is complete, the fluid is recirculated back into the piping system.

“The emulsion is 95% water; the rest is semi-synthetic oil. It is a lubricant that must be treated as spent fluid and disposed of at the end of the process – Camillo Veneri, Head of the Machining Department at Argo Tractors explains. – Oil is regenerated continually and is changed only twice a year thanks to this system”.

Here are some interesting figures about this process: nearly 400 thousand litres of emulsion are recovered every year, which means 3.6 litres of fluid are regenerated per hour of operation per machine.

“This proprietary process patented by our suppliers Technofluids – Camillo Veneri added – requires very few filter cartridges, so that overheads are very low and the environmental impact associated with the disposal of consumables is minimal. We are happy with the results achieved by implementing this effective treatment through all shifts worked in the department”.

This process has attracted the interest of several other companies, even from outside Italy, that have visited the Argo Tractors plant in Fabbrico to understand how the process works and how to lessen the environmental impact of manufacturing processes.