A Numerical Approach to Determine Some Properties of Cylindrical Pieces of Bananas During Drying

2015 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 335-347 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wilton Pereira da Silva ◽  
Cleide M. D. P. S. e Silva ◽  
Aluizio Freire da Silva Junior ◽  
Alexandre José de Melo Queiroz

Abstract This article uses several liquid diffusion models to describe convective drying of bananas cut into cylindrical pieces. A two-dimensional numerical solution of the diffusion equation with boundary condition of the third kind, obtained through the finite volume method, was used to describe the process. The cylindrical pieces were cut into the following dimensions: length of about 21 mm and average radius of 15 mm. Drying air temperatures were 40°C, 50°C, 60°C and 70°C. In order to determine the process parameters, an optimizer was coupled with the numerical solution. A model that considers the shrinkage and variable effective moisture diffusivity well describes drying for all the experimental conditions, and enables to predict the moisture distributions at any given time. For this model, the determination coefficient has varied from 0.99937 (70°C) to 0.99995 (40°C), while the chi-square ranged from 3.41 × 10−4 (40°C) to 4.15 × 10−3 (70°C).

2015 ◽  
Vol 11 (5) ◽  
pp. 691-700 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yasaman Amanlou ◽  
Teymour Tavakoli Hashjin ◽  
Barat Ghobadian ◽  
Gholamhassan Najafi

Abstract The objective of this study is to investigate the drying kinetics of Yarrow, Coriander and Hollyhock flowers. These three medicinal products were dried using a solar hybrid photovoltaic-thermal dryer. The drying process was examined at the air temperatures of 40°C, 50°C and 60°C and air velocities of 0.5, 1 and 1.5 m/s. The experimental drying data were fitted to different theoretical models to predict the drying kinetics. Nonlinear regression analysis was performed to relate the parameters of the model with the drying conditions. The performance of these models was evaluated by comparing the correlation coefficient ($${R^2}$$), root mean square error (RMSE) and the chi-square ($${\chi ^2}$$) between the observed and the predicted moisture ratios. Among all the models, the exponential two-term was found to have the best fit in this study. Also the influence of plant type, air temperature and velocity was investigated.


Author(s):  
Claudia Giovagnoli-Vicuña ◽  
Nelson O. Moraga ◽  
Vilbett Briones-Labarca ◽  
Pablo Pacheco-Pérez

Abstract The influence of drying on the color, porosity, shrinkage and moisture of persimmon fruit during convective drying was determined by computer vision. The experiments were performed with persimmon fruit that were cut into slab 20 × 20 mm, which were arranged into a bigger slab, 60 × 60 mm. Drying process was carried out at 60 °C. Noticeable changes in quality parameters (color, porosity and shrinkage) could be observed during the drying process, where the central region of the sample evidenced less changes. Persimmon’s physical properties were experimentally obtained as the temperature function and heat and mass convective coefficients were adjusted as a time function. A numerical simulation using the Finite Volume Method allowed to describe the evolution of temperature and moisture content distributions during drying. The numerical and experimental results of temperature and moisture during persimmon drying were found to be in a good agreement.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Uriel Jacket Tresor Demby's

In the context of articulated robotic manipulators, the Forward Kinematics (FK) is a highly non-linear function that maps joint configurations of the robot to poses of its endeffector. Furthermore, while in the most useful cases these functions are neither injective (one-to-one) nor surjective (onto), depending on the robot configuration -- i.e. the sequence of prismatic versus revolute joints, and the number of Degrees of Freedom (DoF) -- the associated Inverse Kinematics (IK) problem may be practically or even theoretically impossible to be solved analytically. Therefore, in the past decades, several approximate methods have been developed for many instances of IK problems. The approximate methods can be divided into two distinct categories: data-driven and numerical approaches. In the first case, data-driven approaches have been successfully used for small workspace domains (e.g., task-driven applications), but not fully explored for large ones, i.e. in task-independent applications where a more general IK is required. Similarly, and despite many successful implementations over the years, numerical solutions may fail if an improper matrix inverse is employed (e.g., Moore-Penrose generalized inverse). In this research, we propose a systematic, robust and accurate numerical solution for the IK problem using the Unit-Consistent (UC) and the Mixed (MX) Inverse methods to invert the Jacobians derived from the Denavit-Hartenberg (D-H) representation of the FK for any robot. As we demonstrate, this approach is robust to whether the system is underdetermined (less than 6 DoF) or overdetermined (more than 6 DoF). We compare the proposed numerical solution to data driven solutions using different robots -- with DoF varying from 3 to 7. We conclude that numerical solutions are easier to implement, faster, and more accurate than most data-driven approaches in the literature, specially for large workspaces as in task-independent applications. We particularly compared the proposed numerical approach against two data-driven approaches: Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP) and Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS), while exploring various architectures of these Neural Networks (NN): i.e. number of inputs, number of outputs, depth, and number of nodes in the hidden layers.


2008 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 127 ◽  
Author(s):  
S.B. BAKAL ◽  
K.H. GEDAM ◽  
G.P. SHARMA

In developed countries, more than 50% potatoes are consumed as processed products. As drying is the vital phenomenon in processing, it is necessary to investigate the drying characteristics and its kinetics. In this experimental study, drying kinetics of Potato in two different shape of cuboidal & cylindrical with three aspect ratio was investigated as a function of drying conditions. Experiments were conducted using air temperatures of 50, 60 and 70 ºC, at velocity of 7 ms-1. The experimental moisture data were fitted to Page and simple models available in the literature, and a good agreement was observed. The Page model gave better fit than simple model. In the ranges covered, the values of the effective moisture diffusivity, Deff were obtained between 2.278 × 10-9 to 3.314 × 10-8 m2s-1 from the Fick's diffusion model. Using Deff, the value of activation energy (Ea) was determined assuming the Arrhenius-type temperature relationship.


2020 ◽  
Vol 50 (3) ◽  
pp. 287-302
Author(s):  
Róbert ČUNDERLÍK ◽  
Matej MEDĽA ◽  
Karol MIKULA

The paper presents local quasigeoid modelling in Slovakia using the finite volume method (FVM). FVM is used to solve numerically the fixed gravimetric boundary value problem (FGBVP) on a 3D unstructured mesh created above the real Earth's surface. Terrestrial gravimetric measurements as input data represent the oblique derivative boundary conditions on the Earth's topography. To handle such oblique derivative problem, its tangential components are considered as surface advection terms regularized by a surface diffusion. The FVM numerical solution is fixed to the GOCE-based satellite-only geopotential model on the upper boundary at the altitude of 230 km. The horizontal resolution of the 3D computational domain is 0.002 × 0.002 deg and its discretization in the radial direction is changing with altitude. The created unstructured 3D mesh of finite volumes consists of 454,577,577 unknowns. The FVM numerical solution of FGBVP on such a detailed mesh leads to large-scale parallel computations requiring 245 GB of internal memory. It results in the disturbing potential obtained in the whole 3D computational domain. Its values on the discretized Earth's surface are transformed into the local quasigeoid model that is tested at 404 GNSS/levelling benchmarks. The standard deviation of residuals is 2.8 cm and decreases to 2.6 cm after removing 9 identified outliers. It indicates high accuracy of the obtained FVM-based local quasigeoid model in Slovakia.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yacine Khetib ◽  
Ammar Melaibari ◽  
Radi Alsulami

The present research benefits from the finite volume method in investigating the influence of combined turbulators on the thermal and hydraulic exergy of a parabolic solar collector with two-phase hybrid MWCNT-Cu/water nanofluid. All parabolic geometries are produced using DesignModeler software. Furthermore, FLUENT software, equipped with a SIMPLER algorithm, is applied for analyzing the performance of thermal and hydraulic, and exergy efficiency. The Eulerian–Eulerian multiphase model and k-ε were opted for simulating the two-phase hybrid MWCNT-Cu/water nanofluid and turbulence model in the collector. The research was analyzed in torsion ratios from 1 to 4, Re numbers from 6,000 to 18,000 (turbulent flow), and the nanofluid volume fraction of 3%. The numerical outcomes confirm that the heat transfer and lowest pressure drop are relevant to the Re number of 18,000, nanofluid volume fraction of 3%, and torsion ratio of 4. Furthermore, in all torsion ratios, rising Re numbers and volume fraction lead to more exergy efficiency. The maximum value of 26.32% in the exergy efficiency was obtained at a volume fraction of 3% and a torsion ratio of 3, as the Re number goes from 60,000 to 18,000.


2011 ◽  
Vol 29 (No. 5) ◽  
pp. 528-538 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Aghbashlo ◽  
M.H. Kianmehr ◽  
A. Arabhosseini ◽  
T. Nazghelichi

This paper presents a mathematical modelling of the drying process in a semi-industrial continuous band dryer. Carrot slices with the thickness of 5 mm were used for the drying experiments. The experiments were conducted at three air temperatures, 50, 60, and 70&deg;C, three air velocities, 0.5, 1.0, and 1.5 m/s, and three chain linear velocities, 2.38 &times; 10<sup>&ndash;4</sup>, 2.78 &times; 10<sup>&ndash;4</sup>, and 3.33 &times; 10<sup>&ndash;4</sup> m/s with three replications for each treatment. The Lewis, Henderson &amp; Pabis, and Page models were fitted to the experimental data of the moisture ratio against the sample position using non-linear regression analysis by MATLAB computer program. The models were compared based on their coefficients of determination (R<sup>2</sup>), root mean square errors (RMSE), and reduced chi-squares (&chi;<sup>2</sup>) between the experimental and predicted moisture ratios. Consequently, the Page model was selected as the best mathematical model for describing the drying kinetics of the carrot slices. The correlations of the Page model constants k and m with the variables T, U<sub>a</sub> and U<sub>c</sub> were determined. The effective moisture diffusivity varied from 3.21 &times; 10<sup>&ndash;7</sup> to 8.98 &times; 10<sup>&ndash;7 </sup>m<sup>2</sup>/s. The energy of activation varied from 23.02 kJ/mol to 28.1 kJ/mol using Arrhenius type equation. &nbsp;


2017 ◽  
Vol 2017 ◽  
pp. 1-12
Author(s):  
Qingxue Huang ◽  
Fuqiang Zhao ◽  
Jiaquan Xie ◽  
Lifeng Ma ◽  
Jianmei Wang ◽  
...  

In this paper, a robust, effective, and accurate numerical approach is proposed to obtain the numerical solution of fractional differential equations. The principal characteristic of the approach is the new orthogonal functions based on shifted Legendre polynomials to the fractional calculus. Also the fractional differential operational matrix is driven. Then the matrix with the Tau method is utilized to transform this problem into a system of linear algebraic equations. By solving the linear algebraic equations, the numerical solution is obtained. The approach is tested via some examples. It is shown that the FLF yields better results. Finally, error analysis shows that the algorithm is convergent.


Author(s):  
S. Hormozi ◽  
K. Wielage-Burchard ◽  
I. A. Frigaard ◽  
D. M. Martinez ◽  
D. Grecov

A mixed finite element/finite volume method is used to study the entry/start-up flow of core-annular and channel configurations, with a Newtonian central fluid surrounded by a Bingham lubricating fluid. The established flow is known to be temporally stable. Here we explore issues relating to establishing the flow in realistic geometries. Using transient simulation we show that these flows may be stably achieved for a range of flow parameters and explore the development/entry lengths of the steady established flow. We show that three different development lengths can be defined and explain the variations in development/entry length with the dimensionless parameters. Also, nonlinear temporal stability to axisymmetric perturbations is studied numerically to understand structural aspects of the flow stability, not easily extracted from the energy stability method.


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