472

Karnataka J. Agric. Sci.,25 (4) : (472-474) 2012

Performance evaluation of solar tunnel dryer for chilly drying
VIJAYKUMAR PALLED, S. R. DESAI

, LOKESH AND M. ANANTACHAR
AICRP on Renewable Energy Resources-ORP Activity
College of Agricultural Engineering, Raichur - 584102, India
Email: vs_palled@rediffmail.com
(Received: September, 2011 ; Accepted: November, 2012)
Abstract : One unit of solar tunnel dryer of 18 m X 3.75 m size was commissioned at farmers field in Kotnekal village of
Raichur district of northern Karnataka and evaluated its performance for chilly drying. A maximum temperature of 58.5 C
was recorded at 14:00 hours inside the solar tunnel dryer during drying process which was 41.02 per cent higher than the
maximum ambient temperature (34.5 C) at the same time. On an average, a total drying time of 50 drying hours (6 7 sunny
days) were required for solar tunnel dryer to reduce the moisture content of chilly from initial value of 76 per cent (w.b.) to
a final moisture content of 9 per cent (w.b.) while the open sun drying required on an average 105 drying hours (13 14 sunny
days) to obtain same level of moisture content which resulted in a net saving in drying time of 52.38 per cent for solar tunnel
dryer over open sun drying.
Keywords : Chilly, Drying time, Moisture content, Solar tunnel dryer, Temperature
Introduction
Drying is one of the essential unit operations performed to
increase the shelf life of agricultural / horticultural produce and
it is one of the most practical methods of preserving food and
the quality of horticultural produce. If the drying process is not
completed fast enough, growth of microorganisms will take place
as a result of the high relative humidity. This often leads to
severe deterioration of the quality of the product. Traditionally,
the food products are dried by spreading in open sun in thin
layer. Though this method is economical and simple, it has the
draw backs like; no control over the rate of drying, non-uniform
drying, chances of deterioration due to exposure of products
against rain, dust, storm, birds, rodents, insects and pests which
results in poor quality of dried products. Whereas, solar drying
system leads to fast rate of drying and exposure of products
against rain, dust, storm, birds, rodents, insects and pests are
avoided. This ensures the better quality of dried products, which
would fetch higher price for the dried products. Joy et al. (2001)
used a German made solar dryer to dry red chillies and they
reported that only two days were taken for optimum drying of
red chillies in the solar tunnel dryer whereas it took 7 to 10 days
for convectional method. Mangaraj et al. (2001) dried punched
and unpunched jwaa variety of chillies in a solar cabinet dryer
and reported that it took 36 hours and 54 hours respectively to
dry the punched and unpunched chillies from 300 to 8- 9 per
cent (d.b). Desai et al. (2002) developed and evaluated mini multi-
rack solar dryer for fig drying and reported that the drying time
required to reduce the most of fig from 77.2 per cent to 15 per
cent (w.b.) at full loading rate of 2.5 kg per tray was 28 hours for
solar dryer while the sun drying took 42 hours. Desai et al.
(2009) developed and evaluated a farm solar dryer for chilly
drying in a selected village of Raichur district. They reported
that on an average 41.5 per cent of higher temperature was
obtained in farm solar dryer over the ambient temperature. A
total drying time of 30 hours (4 5 Sunny days) was required for
chilly drying in farm solar dryer to reduce the moisture content
from 76.5 per cent (w.b) to about 9.0 per cent (w.b) as compared
to that of 48 hours for open sun drying for the same level of
moisture contents which resulted in a net saving in drying
time of 37.5 per cent for farm solar dryer over open sun drying.
Palled Vijaykumar et al. (2010) commissioned and evaluated a
solar tunnel dryer of one tonne capacity for grapes drying in
a selected village of Bijapur district. They reported that a
maximum temperature of 62 C was recorded at 14:00 hours
inside the solar tunnel dryer during drying process which was
42.74 per cent higher than the maximum ambient temperature
(35.5 C) at the same time. On an average, a total drying time of
60 drying hours (8 9 sunny days) were required for solar
tunnel dryer to reduce the moisture content of grapes from 82
per cent (w.b.) to a final moisture content of 14 per cent (w.b.)
while the traditional method of shade drying required on an
average 140 drying hours (20 21 sunny days) to obtain same
level of moisture content. This resulted in a net saving of
57.14 per cent in drying time for solar tunnel dryer over open
shade drying.
Material and methods
One unit of solar tunnel dryer of 18 m x 3.75 m size (Fig. 1)
was commissioned at farmers field in Kotnekal village of Raichur
district in northern Karnataka as explained below.
The semi-cylindrical tunnel shape was formed by using 13
numbers of GI pipes having 6 m length. While making semi-
circular frame by bending these pipes, 3.75 m diameter cylindrical
tunnel was formed. The floor was prepared with cement concrete.
The four side boundaries of the floor were constructed with
bricks and cement for a height of 15 cm. The tunnel was covered
with UV stabilized polythene sheet of 200 micron size. In one
side of the tunnel, a suitable frame and door assembly was
fixed. Two exhaust fans of 1 kW capacity each were fixed at
front and rear end of the tunnel in order to regulate the air flow
rate and to maintain the humidity during drying process. Three
chimneys were provided on the roof of the tunnel to remove the
moist hot air.
After installation, the performance of solar tunnel dryer was
evaluated during 2010 for chilly drying at a total loading rate of
350 kg per batch and compared with open sun drying.
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Karnataka J. Agric. Sci., 25 (4) : 2012
The ambient temperature was recorded using a thermometer
with an accuracy of 0.5 C. The temperatures of air at different
levels inside the solar tunnel dryer were recorded by using
thermocouples with k-type sensors at an accuracy of 0.5 C. The
initial weight and physiological loss in weight at different intervals
of time were determined using electronic balance. At every two
hours of interval, the reduction in weight due to drying process
was recorded.
The moisture contents of the sample at different drying
periods were calculated using standard formula (Anon., 2010).
The saving in drying time for solar dryer over open sun drying
was calculated by using the following formula.
Time taken for drying __ Time taken for drying
the product in the product in solar
Saving in open sun dryer
drying =
time (%) Time taken for drying the product in open sun
The dehydration ratio was calculated as the ratio of the
weight of the product before drying to that of dried product.
Results and discussion
The results pertaining to chilly drying in solar tunnel dryer
are presented in Tables 1 and 2 and Figures 2 and 3.
The ambient temperature and temperatures at different levels
inside the solar tunnel dryer are presented in Table 1 and Fig. 2.
The ambient temperature during drying period varied from a
minimum of 27.5 C to a maximum of 34.5C. The corresponding
temperatures inside the solar tunnel dryer ranged from 29 to 56
C, 30.5 to 58.5 C and 29.5 to 57.5 C at front, middle and back
respectively. It was observed that a maximum temperature of
58.5 C was recorded at 14:00 hours at middle of the dryer which
was 41.02 per cent higher than the maximum ambient temperature
(34.5 C) at the same time. This may be due to the absorption of
more solar energy inside the solar tunnel dryer and the prevention
of heat loss from the tunnel dryer. The results were in close
agreement with the findings of Desai et al. (2009) for chilly drying
Table1. Temperature inside the solar tunnel dryer during drying process
Time (hr) Ambient Temperature inside the dryer, (C)
Temperature (C) Front Middle Back
9:00 27.5 29.0 30.5 29.5
10:00 28.5 32.0 34.0 33.5
11:00 30.5 42.5 44.0 43.0
12:00 32.5 49.0 53.0 51.0
13:00 34.0 53.5 55.0 54.0
14:00 34.5 56.0 58.5 57.5
15:00 34.5 55.5 57.0 56.0
16:00 33.0 53.5 55.0 54.5
17:00 31.5 51.0 53.0 52.5
Table 2. Moisture content of chilly in solar tunnel dryer during drying
process
At the Average Moisture Moisture content of
end solar content of chilly in solar tunnel
of intensity chilly in open dryer (% w.b.)
day (W /m
2
) sun drying Front Middle Back
(% w.b.)
1 745 59.48 54.38 53.56 53.98
2 782 49.25 37.56 35.87 36.32
3 738 38.56 26.32 25.43 25.93
4 762 32.84 19.78 18.89 19.05
5 758 27.67 14.54 13.96 14.21
6 746 23.89 12.04 11.95 11.97
7 769 20.35 9.32 9.08 9.29
8 758 18.54
9 783 16.38
10 764 14.97
11 739 12.39
12 762 11.08
13 753 10.05
in farm solar dryer and Vijaykumar Palled et al. (2010) for grapes
drying in solar tunnel dryer.
Moisture content of chilly at the end of each day during
drying process was recorded and presented in Table 2 and
shown in Fig. 3. On an average, a total drying time of 50 drying
hours (6 7 sunny days) were required for solar tunnel dryer to
Fig. 1 Line diagram of solar tunnel dryer
All dimensions are in m
Fig. 2. Temperature inside the solar tunnel dryer drying process
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Performance evaluation of solar tunnel...
reduce the moisture content of chilly from 76 per cent (w.b.) to a
final moisture content of 9 per cent (w.b.) while the open sun
drying required on an average 105 drying hours (13 14 sunny
days) to obtain same level of moisture content which showed a
net saving in drying time of 52.38 per cent for solar tunnel dryer
over open sun drying. This may be due to higher temperature
achieved in solar tunnel dryer as compared to that of ambient
temperature available for open sun drying. The similar results
were reported by Joy et al. (2001) for drying red chilies in solar
tunnel dryer and Vijaykumar Palled et al. (2010) for grapes drying
in solar tunnel dryer. The dehydration ratio of the product was
worked out to be 4:1 indicating that four parts of the original
product was reduced to one part of the final product after drying.
References
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Fig. 3. Moisture content of chilly at the end of each day
during drying process