Method to determine the efficiency assessment indicators of potato treatment by the aerodynamic method

Introduction. Current practices to prepare potatoes for sale have significant drawbacks. The aerodynamic method of potato treatment eliminates them owing to its design features. IEEP - branch of FSAC VIM has manufactured an experimental model of the installation POKAS-1 IEEP to test this method. The required power, energy inputs and productivity of the installation were determined and optimized with the aim to achieve highly efficient treatment of potato tubers. Materials and Methods. Various operating modes of the installation were studied in the experiments according to the developed program and methodology with the use of theoretical modeling methods based on the insight of the processes occurring during the potato treatment. Results. The experimental studies revealed the patterns how the required power, productivity and energy intensity of potato treatment process varied with the nozzle outlet air temperature. The empirical relationship was found to determine the mass of soil particles removed from the potato surface depending on the air temperature. Discussion and Conclusion. The most efficient pre-sale potato treatment by the aerodynamic method was found at the drum rotation frequency of 20 min-1 and the nozzle output temperature of 40 °C, with the optimal required power of the installation being 5.68 kW. When the installation productivity increased from 0.025 t/h to 0.030 t/h, the energy intensity of the technological process was also going up; with the further increase in the productivity from 0.030 t/h to 0.036 t/h the energy intensity of the process dropped drastically. The energy intensity of the process varied from 794.5 to 1124.3 MJ/t depending upon the temperature regime and high power consumption of the installation. The developed method allowed calculating the required power and productivity of the aerodynamic installation and the energy inputs for the process under consideration.