Experimental Validation of the Heat and Mass Transfer Model for Convective Drying

Abstract

The aim of this article is to present a self-consistent mathematical model describing the heat and mass transfer phenomena during the convective drying both in the constant and in the falling drying rate periods. This general model is developed on the basis of the theory of mixtures and the thermodynamics of irreversible processes. The boundary conditions are formulated and the numerical algorithm enabling calculation of the temperature and the drying curves in the two mentioned periods of drying is constructed. In this paper much effort is devoted to the experimental validation of the model. The convective drying of a cylindrical sample made of kaolin was examined both experimentally and numerically for comparison and the distribution of temperature and the drying curves were determined. A very good agreement of the experimental and theoretical results is stated.

Keywords:

• Convective drying
• Heat and mass transfer
• Model validation
• Nonlinear model
• Numerical simulations

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work was carried out as a part of research project No. 3 T09C 030 28 sponsored by the Ministry of Education and Science.