Abstract: An apparatus and method for the continuous clarifying of liquids containing suspended solid substances comprises a flotation cell with a liquid head height of less than 1 meter, with a ratio between the liquid head and the cell diameter comprised between 0.25 and 0.05. The cell has a bottom axial inlet for liquid to be clarified, supersaturated with gas, so as to generate an axial ascending current of the liquid to be clarified with radial divarication toward the surface of the liquid head. A framework associated with the cell rotates concentrically with respect thereto and supports a spillway unit for collecting the flotated layer and a scraper unit which affects all the wet surfaces of the cell. A discharge outlet is furthermore provided in the lower part of the cell for the outflow of clarified liquid which falls toward the bottom of the cell.

Abstract: The room-temperature stabilization process particularly for grape must, includes the steps of conveying a flow of grape must to be stabilized, which has preliminarily been subjected to a depectizing treatment with enzymes, toward a flotation tank, of pressurizing all or part of the must in a pressurization tank with dissolution of an oxidizing gas at a pressure comprised between 2 and 6 bar, of depressurizing the part through a laminar flow valve, of mixing the flow of crude must and the depressurized must, of adding coagulating substances in the flow, of feeding the flow into a tank with a very low head in which the supersaturated gas is released in the form of microscopic bubbles which cling to the particles suspended in the must, making them float toward the surface, of removing the floated solids from the surface of the tank and the settled solids from the bottom, and finally of extracting the stabilized must from the tank after a permanence time of no more than 20 minutes.