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A Novel Design of Crop Dryer for Use in Developing Countries

Article  in  Drying Technology · June 2006

DOI: 10.1080/07373930600626685

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A Novel Design of Crop Dryer for Use
in Developing Countries
R. T. Patil and B. D. Shukla

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Drying Technology, 24: 1–7, 2006

Copyright # 2006 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
ISSN: 0737-3937 print/1532-2300 online
DOI: 10.1080/07373930600626685

A Novel Design of Crop Dryer for Use

in Developing Countries
R. T. Patil and B. D. Shukla
Central Institute of Agricultural Engineering, Nabi Bagh, Berasia Road, Bhopal

markets.[1,3,4] Hence, drying of agricultural commodities

5 The dryer is required for drying of grain as well as drying of the using a suitable dryer becomes essential.
processed products in small catchment agro processing centers in the In developing countries, distress sale of agricultural
developing world. However, due to varied material characteristics of commodities is a common feature in local markets. As
grain and secondary processed product, two entirely different types these markets are flooded with crops for a relatively short 45
of dryers are required. The grain is dried in a recirculatory dryer,
10 whereas processed product is dried in a tray dryer, where it is fre- period, they are forced to be sold at rock-bottom prices.
quently mixed and trays are also intermittently changed. To avoid This leads to miserable financial rewards for farmers.[1]
the need for two dryers, a novel design of a low-cost hot air dryer Nowadays, many small-scale agro processing complexes
was developed where just by changing the trays the dryer can be con- are coming up in rural areas to meet the value addition
verted from an LSU grain dryer to a tray-type product dryer. The requirements of the crops grown in the small catchments 50
15 dryer was tested for drying soybean grain as well as processed soy
products like blanched soybean dal and soyflakes. The capacity of and to deliver the profits of value addition to the growers.
the dryer was 100 kg/batch in a tray dryer with each tray accommo- In these processing centers, a dryer is required for uni-
dating 10 kg of wet material. In case of LSU mode, the capacity of formly drying the raw grains for safe storage until they
the dryer was 250 kg of grain per batch. The drying time required are further processed. Similarly, the dryer is also required
20 was 5 h for 250 kg of wet soybean from 24 to 10% moisture content, for drying of value-added products. The value addition 55
whereas in a tray dryer 100 kg blanched soybean dal was dried from
60 to 10% in 5 h and 100 kg of soyflakes from 25% moisture content could be either wet process, such as in production of full-
to 10% moisture in 1.75 h. The cost of the dryer is estimated at fat soyflour or soyflakes,[5] or semi-wet process, as in the
US$580.00 and it can be fabricated in a moderately equipped work- case of processing of papads,[6] chips,[7] bari’s,[8,9] etc. Pro-
25 shop in developing countries. duction of dehydrated vegetables also requires use of arti-
ficial drying to produce the acceptable quality products. 60
Keywords Soybean; Blanching; Drying; LSU mode; Tray mode; The characteristics of the material handled during dry-
Heat utilization factor ing in primary and secondary processing differs substan-
tially, requiring separate types of dryers for both these
operations. For example, grain requires drying from initial
INTRODUCTION
moisture content of 25% to the level of 8–10%. The grains 65
Drying is an important unit operation for preservation are free flowing and, hence, in-bin or recirculatory dryers
30 of agricultural commodities. Open sun drying is an age-
are used.[10] The secondary processed products generally
old technique for drying the crops in the field. The threshed have very high moistures and are not free flowing. They
grain is also open sun dried by spreading on concrete are required to be dried from more than 60% moisture
floors. It reduces the moisture contents of agricultural pro- down to 8–10%. The large-scale recirculating dryers are 70
duct and allows its safe storage. Since this operation is used for drying grain. Processed products require very
35 weather dependent and exposed, under the conditions of careful drying, as the product is either in the form of
rain, storm, windborne dirt, dust, and infestation by powder, flakes, or wet blanched=soaked grain. The moist-
insects, rodents, and other animals, the quality of the end ure content is added during secondary processing as an
product gets seriously deteriorated and makes it even ined- effect of parboiling, blanching, or soaking. Such a sticky 75
ible.[1,2] The reduction in food quality further results in wet material requires stirring, spreading, and careful hand-
40 adverse economic returns in domestic and international
ling; hence, tray-type dryers are used for processed pro-
ducts. The general agro processing demands two types of
Correspondence: Dr. R. T. Patil, Soybean Processing and dryers, and to own them is a costly proposition for small-
Utilization Centre, Central Institute of Agricultural Engineering,
Bhopal 462 038, India; E-mail: [email protected] scale agro processing centres. 80

1
 2 PATIL AND SHUKLA

Different types of dryers have been developed for drying Sp. heat of grain: 1.67 J=kg
of raw grain as well as that of value-added products.[11–18] Sp. heat of product: 10.50 J=kg
However, their high costs and single use prohibits their use Capacity of grain drying: 250 kg=batch 120
and hence their commercial exploitation is limited only to Capacity of product drying: 100 kg=batch.
85 very high-value commodities like spices and condiments.
The design calculations based on these assumptions
Though the dryer is required for both these purposes, it
were as given in Table 1.
is not economically feasible to suggest two separate dryers
The water evaporated=batch in grain drying and pro-
for such a small industry. Hence, a dryer with a unique
duct drying were 38.88 kg, and 55.55 kg, respectively. The 125
design was developed by the authors and its design as well
heating elements required were 6.25 kW and 8.25 kW in
90 as operational performance has been presented in this
LSU and tray drying system, respectively. Hence the
article. The design is simple but unique where provision
heating unit on the dryer was fitted with 8-kW electrical
was made to convert LSU type grain dryer to tray-type
heaters.
products dryer as per need. The dryer was tested for drying
raw soybean grain as well as drying of value-added pro-
95 ducts from soybean like blanched soy dal and soyflakes. Description of the Dryer 130
The main components of the dryer are the drying cham-
MATERIALS AND METHODS
ber, plenum chamber, heating unit, and air blower (Fig. 1).
Design of the Dryer
The dryer was designed for handling of raw soy grain as
Drying Chamber
in a primary processing operation and, for secondary pro-
100 cessing, the design was based on the drying of blanched
It is a short tunnel-type chamber with side panels prop-
soybean splits. Though the basic design of the dryer is erly insulated with rock wool. The top is kept open and the 135
based on its use for drying soybean and its products, it bottom is closed, with a container for collecting dried
can be used for all agricultural materials with changes in material. The drying chamber is provided with angle iron
drying temperature, air flow rate, and drying schedule runners to house the trays of 60  75  10 cm. The trays
105 required for each individual crop.
are made in two designs, one with inclined plates to make
The following assumptions were made for design of this it as LSU section, and another one with a regular tray with 140
equipment. wire mesh at the bottom. A hinged door is provided at the
front of the dryer. It can be closed and locked after putting
Ambient air temperature: 35
C all the trays for safety and security of the drying material.
Relative humidity of ambient air: 70% The door is closed only when the dryer is operated in a tray
110 Initial moisture content of grain: 24% (wb) mode. The drying chamber as per need can be used as a 145
Initial moisture content of soy product, i.e., blanched dal: tray dryer for soy products or LSU type for drying whole
60% (wb) soybeans simply by putting in the proper trays.
Drying air temperature for grain: 50
C
Drying air temperature for the product: 60
C
115 Drying time per batch: 4 h Plenum Chamber
Exhaust air temperature: 45
C The chamber is trapezoidal, to get mixing of hot air
Latent heat of vaporization: 2510.4 J=kg before it enters the drying chamber. 150

TABLE 1
Design calculations for multipurpose dryer
Parameter LSU grain dryer Tray type dryer
Water evaporated=batch 38.88 kg 55.55 kg
Sensible heat of grain or product=batch 6359.68 J 3012.48 J
Sensible heat of water=batch 5020.8 J 7531.2 J
Latent heat of water vaporization=batch 97.23 J 139.45 J
Total heat required=batch at drying to 10% moisture 121,336 J 166,732.4 J
content level
Air flow required m3=min 21.35 19.58
Heat required=h 30,273.33 J 41,672.64 J
Electrical heaters required 6.25 kW 8.60 kW
 NEW CROP DRYER DESIGN 3

FIG. 1. Novel design of a dryer to be used as tray dryer and also as an LSU grain dryer.

Heating Unit Tray-Type Grain Drying System

The heating unit housed a 16-fin strip air heaters of The trays were made of plywood of 12 mm thickness.
500 watt each. Due to the fins, the heat transfer was The tray bottom was made of galvanized iron wire mesh
quicker and effective. The heaters were connected to three with metallic strip reinforcement. One end of the tray faced
155 phases with 3 kW, 3 kW, and 2 kW operated by 3 separate the air entry and the other end was closed, hence, air, after 180
switches. moving through and over the wet food, went to the upper
tray and thus escaped from the top open exit. Each tray
could accommodate 10 kg of wet material, and the holding
Blower capacity of the dryer was 100 kg=batch.
The blower having a 6-blade impeller of 300 mm diam-
eter was provided. The air blowing capacity of the blower RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 185
3
160 was 20 m =min.
Performance of Multipurpose LSU Grain Dryer
The tests were conducted with Punjab 1 variety of soy-
LSU Grain Drying System bean. The soybean was soaked in excess water for 2 h.
There were 10 trays made of galvanized iron sheet of 20 After 2 h the grain attained moisture content of about
gauge for LSU section (component 6 in Fig. 1). The trays 50%, which was brought down to 24% by drying in the 190
had four raised sides of 10 cm height. In the length-wise shed, so that it represented grain with uniform moisture
165 direction, three baffles of galvanized iron sheet having a content; the condition similar to fresh high moisture grain
45
angle were welded. All the trays were provided with obtained immediately after harvest. The wet grain was
three baffles alternately. The baffles were such that at loaded in trays for the LSU mode of the dryer. The loading
one end they provided opening for hot air, whereas the of the grain was done in stages from bottom to top. As the 195
another end was closed, so hot air had to pass through grain was filled in the bottom tray, the upper tray was
170 the wet material and escaped from the upper baffles, where inserted in the space provided and grain was loaded to fill
an opening was provided for escape of saturated air from it. The sliding strips were kept in place while loading the
the end open to ambient air. After every two trays, sliding dryer. The temperature of drying air for grain drying was
gates (strips of GI sheets) were provided; this arrangement maintained at 50
C. The relative humidity of the drying 200
facilitated recirculation of grain. The dryer accommodated air at 50
C was found to be 25%. The moisture content
175 250 kg of grain. of the composite sample of grain was recorded with drying
 4 PATIL AND SHUKLA

FIG. 2. Temperature and relative humidity of ambient and drying air in

FIG. 4. Variation in drying rate of soybean with drying time in LSU
LSU mode operation.
mode operation.

time. The temperature and relative humidity of the exhaust content seemed constant at the end of 4 and 5 h, the drying
air was also recorded during drying (Fig. 2). The circu- was performed up to 5 h to achieve more uniform reduction
205 lation of grain was done by removing the sliding strip every in drying. The drying curve was further analyzed by plot-
hour and refitting again after the moving the drying grain ting the rate of drying versus drying time on a semi-log
downwards due to gravity. The ambient air temperature paper. The drying rate curve thus obtained was as given 225
during drying was mostly constant at 30
C, and ambient in Fig. 4. It indicated that drying took place in the fall-
relative humidity was found to be 65% in the beginning ing-rate period in two distinct stages. The first falling-rate
210 as the drying was started in the morning but lowered down period continued for 3 h and the second falling rate period
to 50–53% during the next 4–5 h of drying. The exhaust for the last 2; i.e., 3 to 5 h. The average drying rate was
temperature varied between 40 and 43%, and exhaust 0.0931 and 0.0087 kg of water=kg of DM=h during the first 230
RH was between 80 and 85%. and second falling-rate periods, respectively.
The total drying time required to reduce the moisture Drying is an energy-consuming operation. The heat
215 content from 24 to 10% was 5 h. The variation of moisture energy is required for raising the temperature of the grain
content with drying time was as shown in Fig. 3. to drying air temperature and also in the form of sensible
It was observed that drying was faster in the first three heat for heating of moisture to drying air temperature 235
hours due to moisture gradients available between the and thereafter for its evaporation to steam. The heat
grain moisture and equilibrium moisture content of the utilized for drying therefore can be monitored by heat uti-
220 grain under such drying condition. Though the moisture lization factor. It is a ratio of the heat applied to heat
utilized. The heat applied is calculated from the temp-
erature difference between ambient air and drying air. 240
The utilized calculated from the temperature difference
between the drying air and the exhaust air from the drying.
The heat utilization factor while drying was monitored
as per the following equation:
T3  T2
HUF; % ¼  100
T2  T1
where HUF ¼ heat utilization factor, %; T1 ¼ ambient
temperature,
C; T2 ¼ drying air temperature,
C; and
T3 ¼ exhaust air temperature,
C.
The HUF was higher in the beginning when the mois-
ture content was higher; however, it was found to decrease 250
as gradient between initial and final moisture level reduced.
During the first 2 h, it was 90–92%, and finally it came
FIG. 3. Reduction in moisture content of soybean with drying time in down to 46% in the last hour of drying. The average
LSU mode operation. HUF for LSU grain drying mode was 69.6% (Fig. 5).
 NEW CROP DRYER DESIGN 5

FIG. 5. Variation in heat utilization factor during drying of soybean in FIG. 7. Variation in moisture content of blanched soy dal and soy
LSU mode operation. flakes in tray mode operation.

255 Performance of Multipurpose Tray Dryer to see variation of drying rate with time (Fig. 8). The dry-
Drying of Blanched Soy Dal ing rate was plotted against the drying time on the semi-log 275

The initial moisture content of blanched dal was found paper to distinguish between the periods of drying. The
to be 60% wb. The drying time required to reduce the drying rate was found to increase for first hour and there-
moisture content down to 10% was 5 h. The drying air tem- after drying took place in two distinct periods; i.e., first and


260 perature was maintained at 60 C. The average relative
second falling-rate periods. The first falling-rate period was


humidity of drying air at 60 C temperature was 17%. for 2.5 h and the second for the remaining 2.5 h. The aver- 280

The temperature and RH of ambient and exhaust air while age rate periods were 0.4488 and 0.112 kg=kg of DM=h for
drying were as given in Fig. 6. the first and second falling-rate periods, respectively.
The temperature of ambient air was around 30
C and The heat utilization factor while drying of blanched dal
265 relative humidity was 60–64% in the beginning of the
in a tray dryer was also monitored. It was observed that in
drying cycle as drying was started in the morning and the beginning the HUF was as high as 46% and reduced to 285

reduced to 56–58 in the next 4 h of drying. The exhaust 28–30% in the last 3 h (Fig. 9). This may be due to the fact
temperature while drying of blanched dal ranged between that exhaust air temperature was not significantly lower
42 and 44
C, and exhaust relative humidity during drying compared to LSU mode, though drying air temperature
270 was between 74 and 76% in the last 4 h.
was 10
C higher in the case of product=tray mode drying.
The drying curve for blanched dal at 60
C was as given The exhaust air relative humidity was found to be lower 290

in Fig. 7. In case of blanched dal, drying was seen to take compared to grain drying in LSU mode. This indicated
place in two steps. The drying curve was further analyzed

FIG. 6. Temperature and relative humidity of ambient and drying air in FIG. 8. Variation in drying rates of blanched soy dal and soy flakes in
tray mode operation. tray mode operation.
 6 PATIL AND SHUKLA

were 0.1997 and 0.0125 kg=kg of DM=h for the first and
second falling-rate periods, respectively (Figs. 7 and 8).

CONCLUSIONS
A novel design of a low-cost hot air dryer was developed
where just by changing the trays the dryer can be converted 330
from an LSU grain dryer to a tray-type dryer for drying
fruits, vegetables, and secondary processed foods. The
dryer was tested for drying of soybean grain as well as
wet non-free-flowing products like blanched soydal and
soyflakes. The capacity of the dryer was 100 kg=batch in 335
the tray dryer, with each tray accommodating 10 kg of
wet material. In case of LSU mode, the capacity of the
FIG. 9. Variation in heat utilization factor with drying time for tray dryer was 250 kg of grain per batch. The drying time
mode operation.
required was 5 h for drying of 250 kg of wet soybean from
24 to 10% moisture content, whereas in the tray dryer the 340
blanched dal of 100 kg was dried from 60 to 7.5% in 5 h
that this dryer was being effectively utilized in case LSU
and 100 kg of soyflakes from 25% moisture content to
mode drying compared to in-tray mode drying. This indi-
8% moisture in h. The cost of the dryer is estimated at Q1
cates that higher loading density and slower exit of satu-
US$580.00 and it can be fabricated in a moderately
295 rated could be done to increase the heat utilization factor
equipped workshop in developing countries. 345
of this dryer in the tray mode operation. The average value
of HUF of the dryer in tray drying operation was only
34%, and hence there is a scope to improve this factor that
NOMENCLATURE
will also help in improving the overall capacity of the dryer.
db Dry basis
300 This could be done by providing the heat spreader in the
Dal Split cotyledons
plenum chamber, which will reduce the air velocity, thereby
DM Dry matter
providing longer residence time for the air in the dryer. The
HUF Heat utilization factor
HUF can also be increased by recirculating the exhaust air
J Joule
to the inlet blower in the later part of drying process. This
kW Kilowatt
305 method will use exhaust air from the drying chamber as
RH Relative humidity (%)
partial substitute to the fresh air, which together when
T1 Ambient temperature (
C)
heated will need less energy input. This will also involve
T2 Hot air temperature (
C)
the additional cost of fabrication, but that can be recovered
T3 Exhaust temperature (
C)
from the energy saved during drying. However, compared
t Time
310 to the data reported by other researchers, the HUF of
wb Wet basis
our dryer was significantly higher. Singh[13] reported the
overall thermal efficiency of a tray dryer as 30.83, 28.21,
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