Determination of rational parameters of the drum mixer operation when receiving bulk products

The mixing process is widely used in various areas of production: for the manufacture of various types of products and semi-finished products, such as agricultural mixtures, suspensions, bone cements and others. This process is the movement of particles of bulk material components in the space of the mixed volume. Various types of mixing apparatus are used to move the components. One of the most common mixers are continuous drum type mixers. An important problem that needs to be dealt with when developing a mixer design is reducing the coefficient of heterogeneity of the resulting mixture. The heterogeneity of the granular mixture is associated with different physical and chemical properties of the components of which it consists. These include density, flowability, viscosity, etc. The object of study is a new design of a drum mixer with an internal drum. The subject of the study is the design features of this mixer, including the length of the inner drum, the angle of inclination of the drum and the frequency of its rotation. These design features affect the final state of the mixture. Experiments conducted with various indicators of the mixer operating parameters helped to identify the most optimal values of these parameters, at which the value of mixture heterogeneity is minimal. A total of 27 experiments were carried out. For clarity, all results are presented in the form of graphs. The graphs show that the optimal value of the parameters is: the length of the internal drum generatrix is 0.6 meters, the angle of inclination of the apparatus is α = 5° and the drum rotation speed is n = 45 rpm. At these values, the heterogeneity of the mixture is minimal, Vc = 9.63 %.