Abstract: According to the invention, the grains of the hydrate slurry are separated by sedimentation where the dispersed bubbles of air are removed in course of the presizing, then a supplementary sizing is carried out. Preferably, a liquid free from hydrate grains is fed in to stream against the sinking grains. This liquid is advantageously the spent liquor of the hydrate filter. The apparatus according to the invention consists of a container with conical bottom, a feeding device, a slurry outlet stub and an overflow channel. The inlet stubs of the feeding device, however, are placed off-center and every stub is connected with a presizing equipment. This equipment is composed of a bundle of pipes and/or a pack of plates which are slop placed to geometrical axis: At the upper part of the presizing equipment there is a foam overflow apparatus. The bottom of each presizing equipment is connected with a common cone-frustum type deflector casing. The casing is concentric with the container.

Abstract: The invention relates to plant operations for increasing the cycle times of heat exchangers by the digestion of the aluminium oxide content of a slurry according to the Bayer technology, said slurry consisting of bauxite and sodium aluminate liquor, using an equipment in which the material is heated stepwise and in more parallel material streams, then the material streams are combined and further heated, or combined and kept at the same temperature, or after combination further heated and kept at the same temperature, characterized in that a part of the parallel material streams is slurry, another part of same is aqueous sodium hydroxide solution, preferably sodium aluminate liquor containing sodium hydroxide, or water, and the parallel material streams are exchanged in the heat exchangers in a cyclical manner.