Developing and Assessing Performance of a Laboratory-Scale Fluidized Bed Dryer

A laboratory-scale batch fluidized bed dryer with 75 mm bed diameter was designed, fabricated and evaluated to study the hydrodynamics of river sand as well as the drying of cassava mash and bitter kola particulates. The hydrodynamics properties such as minimum fluidization velocity, effect of bed height and pressure drop across the bed, effect of particle size  and density on minimum fluidization velocity and stability of the bed column of river sand were studied. Drying of cassava mash to edible garri was carried out at in fluidized bed dryer  at controlled temperatures. Drying characteristics of the laboratory fluidized bed dryer was compared with the laboratory WiseVen oven (model number: WOF - 105) using bitter kola particulate material sample. The experimental results from laboratory-scale fluidized bed dryer showed that the minimum fluidization velocity increases as material density increases and the value of the minimum fluidization velocity obtained from the fluidized bed gave good agreement with other empirical correlation such as Kozeny-Carman Equation. The fluidized bed dryer showed high rates of moisture removal over the conventional oven with the ratio of 1:29 under the same operating conditions. Drying of cassava mash to edible garri was achieved at lower drying temperatures of 83 oC \(\pm\) 3 oC at 55 minutes when compared to conventional frying temperatures of cassava mash to edible at 180 – 200 oC thereby saving energy cost. Hence, this fluidized bed dryer is recommended for use in demonstrating hydrodynamics and drying of particulate materials in the laboratory.