r/labrats • u/Special-Ad6731 • 2d ago

Chromatography column cracked and fractured

A GE Superdex 200 Increase 5/150 GL column of our lab was just found cracked and fractured (not the resin inside, the actual glass column body). We asked around, but nobody's admitted to mishandling it yet. We'd want to rule out the possibility of it happening spontaneously before going through the CCTV footage and pointing fingers. Has anyone known a column body cracking for no apparent reason (maybe room temperature dropping or internal pressure)? Many thanks!

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u/Between3and20again 2d ago

Superdex and Sephadex resin in particular will crack the glass column if stored in ethanol cold and then allowed to warm to room temperature. I’ve seen it twice with large scale columns and the first time we blamed the cleaning crew until it happened again and we learned.

Also you can empty it, buy a new cylinder, and pack it again. But those tricorns are not enjoyable to pack

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u/Special-Ad6731 1d ago

Thanks for the insight! May I ask what did you do to prevent this from happening again after you noticed the cause? Do you stop storing the column in ethanol at 4C, or avoid the 4C/RT warming while its in ethanol? Thanks again.

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u/mdwsl 1d ago

If they have those springy end caps they shouldn’t break due to expansion or contraction since extra liquid can go into/out of them. Yours has one on top.

Also, those tiny columns can take like 20 bar of pressure

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u/Between3and20again 1d ago

Ya this guys right. I was using way bigger columns that can’t handle pressure like that and we would just cap the ends.

To answer your question we would just stopped the warming to RT in ethanol.