Maintenance and Troubleshooting
Agilent 5100 and 5110 ICP-OES User’s Guide
59
Acid cleaning of the torch for aqueous or acid based samples
See Page 34 for demountable torch disassembly instructions.
Figure 12.
Torch components where 1. Ball joint, 2. Gas ports, 3. Torch securing
ring (demountable torch only), and 4. Torch outer tube
To clean the torch:
1
Soak the quartz parts of the torch in 50% aqua regia (1 part water
to 1 part aqua regia) for at least 1 hour. To make aqua regia
combine 1:3 concentrated nitric acid: hydrochloric acid. The
length of time required for the cleaning procedure will depend
upon the extent of the contamination. Do not leave the torch in
the acid for longer than 8 hours.
IMPORTANT
For one-piece torches:
use a clean, wide diameter, open-top beaker or a similar
container to hold the torch inverted while soaking in acid.
For two-piece demountable torches:
Use a large enough beaker or similar
container to fully submerge the torch quartz tube.
Use clean/particle free acid to perform the soak.
2
One-piece torches:
Place the torch in the vessel so that the acid
covers the quartz to just below the plastic base. See Figures 13A
and 14. To remove build up from the lower part of the injector,
pipette some of the acid through the ball joint of the injector. See
Figure 12.
1
2
3
4
