The Effect of Variety, Size, and Moisture Content Of Sunflower Seed And Its Kernel On Their Terminal Velocity, Drag Coefficient, and Reynold's Number

Abstract

In this article, terminal velocity, Reynold's number, and drag coefficient of three varieties of Iranian sunflower seed and its kernel were evaluated as a function of size and moisture content at three moisture content levels in the range of 3 to 14% d.b. The obtained results showed that terminal velocity and Reynold's number of sunflower seed and its kernel for the studied varieties and size categories increased and drag coefficient for both seed and kernel decreased with the increase in moisture content. Investigating the effect of size revealed that terminal velocity and Reynold's number of sunflower seed and its kernel increased as size of the samples increased from small to large while the drag coefficient of sunflower seed decreased with increasing size. In contrast, drag coefficient of the sunflower kernel increased with the increase in size.

Keywords:

• Aerodynamic properties
• Sunflower seed and kernel
• Moisture content
• Variety
• Size

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors would like to thank Ferdowsi University of Mashhad for providing the laboratory facilities and financial support.