DISCUSSION

Tray dryer experiment was conducted to study the drying process and drying
rate curves for a wet solid when being dried with air of fixed temperature and humidity.
Theoretically, drying process occurs by effecting vaporization of the liquid by supplying
heat to the wet feedstock, so the tray dryer operation basically uses air velocity passed
over a heated element as a medium of mass transfer to evaporate moisture from a wet
solid (Borde & Levy, 2006). Drying process plays the important role in the industries
especially in the food process industry. The wide varieties of instant and dehydrated
foods, which today are available to the consumer are amongst the application of the
drying rate (Ekechukwu, 2015).

The experiment is done by using the SOLTEQ Tray Dryer (Model: BP722). The
general starts up procedure and the experiment are begun. The data collected are
temperature of the wet and dry bulb for inlet and outlet, the velocity and the mass of
the sand with the trays. The result of the experiment is tabulated in table and the graphs
of the relationship are plotted. The first relationship to be discussed is the relationship
between the moisture content with time. Basically, the moisture content is the amount
of the water in sand which is needed to know as indication of the drying rate. The
higher the moisture content indicates the higher of the amount of water in the sand.
The experiment is conducted for 50 minutes and the data of the weight of the sand is
recorded in every interval of 5 minutes. Air velocity is read were constant throughout
the experiment, at 0.67 m/s by using Rota meter. Dried sand weighed is 708.7g and
after being splashed with water, the weight is 728.4g. The wet sand which had been
filled in the tray is placed inside the tray dryer. The weight of the sand was constantly
measured every 5 minutes.

Table B was shown the result of the experiment for every 5 minutes. The table
B shows mass of wet sand was decrease proportional with time of air has been supply.
The changes of wet sand mass from initial until the end is decrease gradually but
maybe because of some error which is the sand was not divided equally through the
tray. One part of the tray had thick layer of sand while the other part had thin layer, so
the drying operation also cannot occur 100% efficiency. This happen causes the sand
used at early stage is might be not dry enough and all moisture at the bottom of the
sand were transferred up to the surface of the sand by perfect diffusion process which
capillary forces work in diffusion process completely successful. In table C show the
total moisture content, XT which is the amount of moisture in sand. This XT was
decrease with increasing of time until the total moisture content, XT was getting
constant (X*), but in this experiment it is reading until zero because the mass of sand
exactly same as dry sand at time 50 minutes.

Based on the data gained from the experiment conducted, the free moisture
content in the sand is decreasing against the increasing of time. This is because as
the time increase, the air drawn in and the high temperature flowed into the central
section where the sand is placed, caused the liquid in the wet solid to transfer to an
unsaturated gas phase that suspended in the air stream out of the dryer. The drying
rate approaches zero at some equilibrium Moisture Content which is the lowest
moisture content of wet sand that is measured in terms of the weight of moisture per
unit weight of dry material. At time 50 minutes, the mass of wet sand weighed is 400.6
g that is same as the initial weight of the sand. So, the total moisture content is 0 which
is mean there is no moisture in the dry sand.

For this experiment, there are another relationship that needs to be study is the
relationship between the drying rate and moisture content. Theoretically, the graph will
have the increasing pattern until it achieved the equilibrium at some period of time. At
that moment, the drying rate is said to be constant. To observe the relationship, the
graph of Drying Rate versus Moisture Content is plotted. From the experiment, the
curve on graph of the drying rate versus moisture content is totally different from
expected. The pattern of the graph shows the increasing and decreasing pattern of
drying rate versus moisture content. The plots seem shows the unstable drying rate is
occur throughout the experiment.

Results obtained were not consistent maybe come from the heater that is
supposedly heat up the air that being sucked into the chamber by axial fan. Therefore,
it has a sensor that will cause it to automatically control the power supply when the
desired temperature is achieved and heat up against once the temperature drops.
However, the heater might be malfunction and this lacking leads to the inaccuracy of
the experimental results as the heater did not heat up the temperature of the air flows.
Thus, the drop and increase in temperature cannot be controlled and affecting the
moisture content in the sand. Besides, the error might happen during the experiment
which is the water that been splashed onto the dry sand were not been splashed
properly. The water was maybe gathered only at same place and this causes the drying
process did not become 100% efficient.

The wet and dry bulb temperature obtained is almost constant during the
experiment because of the dry. The wet bulb will be lower than dry bulb because the
wet bulb measures the hot air temperature under 100% humidity where else the dry
bulb measures the hot air at original state. The temperature of the wet and dry bulb of
the air were measured using a Psychrometer. At steady state, the temperature of the
wet solid surface is wet bulb temperature of the drying medium. The wet bulb
temperature increased across time showed that the humidity of air increased as the
increasing in the evaporation of the water from the wet sand.

There are two graphs for drying curve in this experiment which are figure 1 and
2. Usually there are 3 phases for a normal drying curve. First phase is initial period.
Sensible heat is transferred to the product and contained moisture. The curve must be
increase because the rate of evaporation increasing during this phase. For the second
phase, the constant period. The curve will be neither increase nor decrease because
at this phase, free moisture persists, and very little evaporation occurs. Lastly, the
falling period where the curve will be declined because free moisture persists on the
surface and the rate of evaporation change a little bit as the moisture content reduces.

Based on figure 1, it is slightly similar where it has an increasing period, from 0

until 0.0310, moisture content. There may be an error in the reading taken, but the
critical moisture content is at 17.6561, drying rate. The constant period starts at 0.0310
until 0.0390, moisture content. And finally, from 0.0390 until 0.0447 the graph is
declining, showing that it has a falling period. For figure 2, the graph was similar to the
normal graph which is the normal graph shows that free moisture content decreases
as time increases. The graph Is plotted to show the relationship between time and free
moisture content. So, from this graph, we can get the exact time when each period
happens. In the graph, the constant rate period is at 10s, the critical moisture content
is at 20s, the falling rate period is between 20s–25s and the equilibrium moisture
content is at 100s.

Borde, I., & Levy, A. (2006). Pneumatic and Flash Drying, (November).
https://doi.org/10.1201/9781420017618.ch16

Ekechukwu, V. (2015). DRYING PRINCIPLES AND THEORY : AN OVERVIEW,

(October).