DISCRETE ELEMENT SIMULATION - ENHANCING THE DESIGN AND WORKING PARAMETERS OF FRUIT SIZING EQUIPMENT

Abstract

For agricultural fruits, the classification by size is an important quality indicator that serves a number of purposes such as consumer preferences, market
requirements, product pricing, packaging specifications, and post-harvest processing operations…. This study performed Discrete Element simulations to assist in the
design and determination of working parameters of the rotary drum sizing equipment. Simulations focused on determining the motion of the fruits along the rotating
axis and working parameters of the equipment (angular velocity of the rotary drum). Simulation matrix with 7 cases has been proposed and conducted. In order for the
fruits to move easily along the rotating drum, the drum frame bars are tilted in the direction of rotation of the cage at an angle of 12°. For a yield of 7.2 tons/h, a drum
with a diameter of 800mm, with 5 sorting chambers of 1000mm long each, the optimal angular velocity of the rotating drum is 12.5 rpm. The Discrete Element simulation
method can fully assist engineers/researchers in designing working parameters of fruit sorting equipment, minimizing the production of prototypes, which is currently
high in terms of cost, manpower and time.