Journal of Food Engineering 64 (2004) 97–102

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Influence of airflow velocity on kinetics of convection apple drying

D. Veli
c *, M. Planini
c, S. Tomas, M. Bili
c
Department of Process Engineering, Faculty of Food Technology, University J.J. Strossmayer of Osijek, F. Kuhaca 18,
P.O. Box 709, 31000 Osijek, Croatia
Received 30 May 2003; accepted 13 September 2003

Abstract
The aim of this experiment was to investigate airflow velocity influence (0.64, 1.00, 1.50, 2.00, 2.50 and 2.75 m s
1 ) on the kinetics
of convection drying of Jonagold apple, heat transfer and average effective diffusion coefficients. Drying was conducted in a con-
vection tray drier at drying temperature of 60
C using rectangle-shaped (20 · 20 · 5 mm) apple samples. Temperature changes of
dried samples, as well as relative humidity and temperature of drying air were measured during the drying process. Rehydratation
ratio was used as a parameter for the dried sample quality. Kinetic equations were estimated by using an exponential mathematical
model.
The results of calculations corresponded well with experimental data. Two well-defined falling rate periods and a very short
constant rate period at lower air velocities were observed. With an increase of the airflow velocity an increase of heat transfer
coefficient and effective diffusion coefficient was found. During rehydratation, about 72% of water removed by the drying process
was returned.
 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Airflow velocity; Convection apple drying; Exponential drying model; Effective diffusion coefficient; Heat transfer coefficient

Apple is an important raw material for many food
products and apple plantations are cultivated all over
the world in many countries. Thus, it is very important
to define the conditions under which the characteristics
of fresh apples can be preserved and to define optimal
parameters for their storage and reuse.
Drying is a frequently and used procedure for food
preservation. Convection drying as well as other tech-
niques for drying are used in order to preserve the
original characteristics of apples. Dried apples can be
consumed directly or treated as a secondary raw mate-
rial.
High temperatures and long drying times required to
remove the water from the fruit material in convection
air drying may cause serious damage in flavour, colour,
nutrients and can reduce the bulk density and rehydra-
tation capacity of the dried product (Lin, Durance, &
Scaman, 1998).
There is a growing interest in the food industry in
the development of economical methods for food
*
Corresponding author. Tel.: +385-31-224-352; fax: +385-31-207-
115.
E-mail address: darko.velic@ptfos.hr (D. Veli
c).
0260-8774/$ - see front matter  2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jfoodeng.2003.09.016
production with high organoleptic and nutritional
value. The purpose of this study was to study con-
vection drying of apple in laboratory conditions and
to investigate the influence of airflow velocities on
drying kinetics, heat transfer coefficient and effective
diffusion coefficient.
1. Materials and methods
1.1. Drying equipment
Drying was performed in a pilot plant tray dryer
(UOP 8 Tray Dryer, Armfield, UK). The dryer operates
on the thermogravimetric principle. The dryer (Fig. 1) is
equipped with controllers for controlling the tempera-
ture and airflow velocity. Air was drawn into the duct
through a diffuser by a motor driven axial flow fan
impeller. In the tunnel of the dryer there were carriers
for trays with samples, which were connected to a bal-
ance. The balance was placed outside the dryer and
continuously determined and displayed the sample
weight. A digital anemometer at the end of the tunnel
measured airflow velocity.
98 D. Veli
c et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 64 (2004) 97–102

Nomenclature

a, K parameters in model (8) dX 0 =dt drying rate (min
1 )

c specific heat (J kg
1 K
1 ) v air velocity (m s
1 )
CP critical point k heat conductivity (W m
1 K
1 )
h heat transfer coefficient (W m
2 K
1 ) l dynamic viscosity of air (Pa s)
k, n parameters in model (2) # temperature (
C)
L length (m) q density of air (kg m
3 )
‘ sample thickness (m)
Subscripts
m weight (kg)
db dry basis
Nu Nusselt number
w water
Pr Prandtl number
0 initial
Re Reynolds number
a air
t drying time (min)
e equilibrium
T temperature (K)
f film
X moisture (kgw kg
1
db ) s surface
X0 dimensionless moisture

Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of the convection drying equipment (UOP 8 Tray Dryer, Armfield, UK).

1.2. Material
Apples (Jonagold) were obtained from a local super-
market and stored at +4
C. After 2-h stabilization at
the ambient temperature, apples were hand peeled and
cut to the rectangle-shaped slices, dimensions: 20 · 20 · 5
mm.
1.3. Drying procedure
The dryer was operated at air velocities 0.64, 1.0, 1.5,
2.0, 2.5 and 2.75 m s
1 , with 60
C dry bulb temperature
and average relative humidity of 9%. Air flowed parallel
to the horizontal drying surfaces of the samples. Drying
process started when drying conditions were achieved
(60
C and constant air velocity). The apple samples on
trays were placed into the tunnel of the dryer and the
measurement started from this point. During the drying
process temperature changes of dried samples were
continuously recorded by thermocouples connected to a
PC. ‘‘Testo 350’’ probes placed into the drying chamber
measured relative humidity and drying air temperature.
Sample weight loss was recorded every 5 min during the
drying process using a digital balance (with precision of
±0.01 g). Dehydration lasted until a moisture content of
about 20% (wet base) was achieved. Airflow velocity was
measured every 5 min with a digital anemometer that
was placed at the end of the tunnel. Dried samples were
kept in airtight glass jars until the beginning of rehy-
dratation experiments.
1.4. Determination of the total solid/moisture content
The moisture content of the dried samples was de-
termined by using a standard laboratory. Small quanti-
ties of each sample were dried in a vacuum oven (6 h at of
70
C and 30 mbar pressure). Time dependent moisture
content of the samples was calculated from the sample
weight and dry basis weight. Weight loss data allowed
the moisture content to be calculated such as follows:
 D. Veli
c et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 64 (2004) 97–102 99

X ðtÞ ¼ mw =mdb 1.7. Calculation of the heat transfer coefficient

Convective heat transfer occurs between a moving

1.5. Rehydratation fluid and a solid surface. This work investigated con-
vective heat transfer for forced convection flow over a
The rehydratation characteristics were used as a flat plate. The viscosity of the fluid requires that the fluid
quality index of a dried product. Approximately 3 g has zero velocity at the plate’s surface. Because a
(±0.01 g) of dried samples were placed in a 250 ml boundary layer exists, the flow is initially laminar but
laboratory glass (2 parallels for each sample), 150 ml can proceed to turbulence once the Reynolds number of
distilled water was added, the glass was covered and the flow is sufficiently high (Pitts & Sissom, 1977).
heated up to the boiling point within 3 min. The content It was assumed that the plate (sample) was main-
of the laboratory glass was then cooked for 10 min by tained at constant temperature (Ts ) and the plate length
mild boiling and cooled. Cooled content was filtered for (L) was sufficiently short so that turbulent flow was
5 min under vacuum, and weighed. never triggered (Fig. 2).
The rehydratation ratio (R) was used to express Average heat transfer coefficient was calculated using
ability of the dried material to absorb water (Lewicki, Pohllhausen equation (4) for laminar flow and other
1998). It was determined by the following equation: correlations (5) and (6) that are given below:
1=2
Rehydratation ratio% Nulam ¼ 0:664  Relam  Pr1=3 ðvalid for Re < 2  105 Þ
mass of water absorbed during rehydratation ð4Þ
¼  100
mass of water removed during drying hL Lvq lc
Nu ¼ ; Re ¼ ; Pr ¼ ð5Þ
ð1Þ k l k
All calculations were performed at the average film
temperature (Tf ):
1.6. Drying rate curve determination
Ta þ Ts
Tf ¼ ½K ð6Þ
The exponential model successfully describes the 2
drying kinetics of some porous materials, such as clay where are: Ta ––air temperature [K], Ts ––average tem-
(Skansi & Tomas, 1995; Tomas, Skansi, & Sokele, perature of sample surface [K].
1994), Al–Ni catalyst (Sander, Tomas, & Skansi, 1998)
and food materials (Tomas & Skansi, 1996). The au- 1.8. Determination of the effective diffusion coefficient
thors also used this model to describe the changes of
moisture content and drying rates. The time dependent The simplified method (Zogozsa, Maroulis, & Mari-
weight of samples was converted for the given time de- nos-Kouris, 1994) was used for determination of the
pendent to moisture content. effective diffusion coefficient. For a thin plate the solu-
To avoid some ambiguity in results because of the tion of Fick’s law of diffusion, with assumptions of
differences in initial sample moisture, the sample mois- moisture migrating only by diffusion, negligible shrink-
ture was expressed as dimensionless moisture ratio ing, constant temperature and diffusion coefficients and
(X 0 ¼ X ðtÞ=X0 ). The drying curve for each experiment long drying times, are given below (Baroni & Hubinger,
was obtained by plotting the dimensionless moisture of 1998):
the sample vs. the drying time. For the approximation !
of experimental data and calculating drying curves X
Xe X
n¼1
8
Deff ð2n þ 1Þ2 p2 t
¼ 2 2
exp
(Eq. (2)) and drying rate curves (Eq. (3)), the simplified X0
X e n¼0 ð2n þ 1Þ p
4‘2
model was used, as follows:
ð7Þ
0 ð
ktn Þ
X ðtÞ ¼ exp ð2Þ where Xe and X0 represent equilibrium and initial
dX 0 moisture contents, and ‘ is the slab thickness. The value

¼ k  n  tðn
1Þ  X 0 ðtÞ ð3Þ
dt
The parameters k and n were calculated by non-linear
regression method (Quasi-Newton) using Statistica 6.0
computer program. The correlation coefficient (r2 ) was
used as a measure of model adequation. The first and
second critical points were determined as a maximum
and point of inflexion of the function (
dX =dt) (Tomas
& Skansi, 1996). Fig. 2. Convection heat transfer for forced flow over a flat plate.
100 D. Veli
c et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 64 (2004) 97–102

of the equilibrium moisture content is relatively small

(low air relative humidity) compared to X or X0 . Thus
ðX
Xe Þ=ðX0
Xe Þ is simplified to X 0 ¼ X =X0 (dimen-
sionless moisture ratio) (Doymaz & Pala, 2002).
Where sample thickness is small (0.005 m) and drying
time is relatively large, only the first term of Fickan’s
solution series is need, and Eq. (7) becomes:
X 0 ¼ a  expð
K  tÞ ð8Þ
where K ¼ ðDeff p2 Þ=ð4‘2 Þ is represent the slope of X 0 vs. t
plotting on the semi-logarithmic diagram.

Fig. 3. Experimental and calculated moisture contents vs. drying time.

2. Results and discussion

The results of numerical adoptions of experimental

data are summarized in Table 1. The moisture contents
(experimental and modelled data) vs. drying time at dif-
ferent airflow velocities are shown in Fig. 3. It can be seen
that a good agreement between experimental data and
chosen mathematical model exists, which is confirmed by
high values of correlation coefficient (0.9991–0.9995).
Results show that the airflow rate had a significant effect
on drying rates of apple. With the increase of the air flows
velocity, the time required to achieve certain moisture
content decreased.
Fig. 4 shows typical drying curves, which are char-
acterised by two falling rate periods with no undoubt-
edly apparent constant rate period. However, it might
be possible to have a very short constant rate period at
Fig. 4. Drying rate vs. drying time for different airflow velocities with
lower airflow velocities (0.64, 1.0 and 1.5 m s
1 ) followed
first and second critical points.
after the initial period of increasing drying rate. In this
period samples retained almost constant temperature
(Fig. 5) and then kept growing. After the first critical drying rate of the sample, the results suggested that in
point (in interval from 0.8176 to 0.9186 kgw kg
1 db ), the
the second period drying was faster than in the first
internal resistance of product increase, resulted in the falling rate period. Similar results were obtained during
first falling rate period. The second falling rate period the drying of sweet potato slices (Diamante, 1994).
started after the second critical point (around 0.3 Rehydratation did not show a clear dependence of
kgw kg
1
db according to air velocity). If the slope of tan-
rehydratation ability of dried apple on airflow velocity.
gent to the drying curve (
dX =dt) was considered as the During the rehydratation, dried sample absorbed be-

Table 1
Results of numerical analyses [model (2)]. Time, dimensionless moisture and drying rate in the first and second critical points at different airflow rate
v (m s
1 ) 0.64 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 2.75
k 0.002917 0.004230 0.005829 0.009298 0.009846 0.012683
n 1.252203 1.225387 1.201714 1.116508 1.110101 1.092722
r2 0.999140 0.999309 0.999186 0.999486 0.999516 0.999185

t (min) CP1 29.4 21.7 20.2 8.7 8.0 5.7

CP2 122.5 99.3 91.9 72.1 69.9 58.6

X0 CP1 0.81758 0.83199 0.83170 0.90091 0.90558 0.91865

CP2 0.30077 0.30607 0.30596 0.33143 0.33314 0.33795
dX 0 =dt CP1 0.00701 0.00863 0.00932 0.01204 0.01245 0.01496
(min
1 ) CP2 0.00369 0.00447 0.00483 0.00566 0.00581 0.00683
CP1 ––first critical point; CP2 ––second critical point.
 D. Veli
c et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 64 (2004) 97–102 101

Fig. 5. Temperature of sample vs. drying time for different airflow

Fig. 6. Semi-logarithmic dimensionless moisture ratio vs. drying time
velocities.
in the falling rate period for different airflow velocities.

tween 63.80% and 79.25% of water, which was removed,

by drying (Table 2).
As the airflow velocity increased, the heat transfer
coefficient for drying apples also increased almost pro-
portionally (Table 2; Fig. 7).
The semi-logarithmic dimensionless moisture vs.
drying time plot for falling rate period at different air
velocities is shown in Fig. 6.
Two well-defined falling rate periods are observed,
each corresponding to an approximately constant slope
from which the effective diffusion coefficients are calcu-
lated. With increasing the airflow rate, Deff increases too
in the both periods. For the examined airflow rate, the
Fig. 7. The effect of airflow velocity on the heat transfer coefficient and
value of the average effective diffusion coefficient in the effective diffusion coefficients.
first falling rate period ranged from 1.7 · 10
9 to
3.0 · 10
9 m2 s
1 (Table 2). That accords with the liter-
ature data for food products such as: vegetable wastes 3. Conclusion
(Lopez, Iguaz, Esnoz, & Virseda, 2000), carrot and po-
tatoes (Mulet, 1994), apple cubes (Simal, Dey
a, Frau, & The drying kinetics of Jonagold apple, average heat
Rossel
o, 1997) and apple tissues (Feng, Tang, & Dixon- transfer coefficient and average effective diffusion coef-
Werren, 2000). Whereas, in the second falling rate pe- ficient at airflow rate: 0.64, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5 and 2.75
riod average Deff was around 1.6 times greater than in m s
1 were obtained by a thermogravimetric method.
the first period, and it ranged from 2.9 · 10
9 to As can be observed, by using the exponential model it
4.4 · 10
9 m2 s
1 . This is corresponds with conclusions is possible to accurately simulate the drying kinetics of
that the rate of diffusion is proportional to the sample apple at different air velocities. An increase of airflow
temperature (Diamante, 1994), which in this case de- velocity resulted in increase of moisture removal rate.
pends on the airflow velocities and heat transfer coeffi- Two well-defined falling rate periods with different
cient (Fig. 7), and that the value of Deff increases in time drying rates and effective diffusion coefficients were ob-
(Simal, Rossello, Berna, & Mulet, 1994). served at all examined air rate.

Table 2
Rehydratation ratio, heat transfer coefficient and effective diffusion coefficient for drying apple at different airflow ratio
v (m s
1 ) 0.64 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 2.75
R (%) 79.15 63.80 72.20 79.25 72.00 75.95
h (W m
2 K
1 ) 21.43 26.73 32.72 37.87 42.28 44.30
Deff;1 (m2 s
1 ) 1.70 · 10
9 2.06 · 10
9 2.26 · 10
9 2.56 · 10
9 2.64 · 10
9 3.02 · 10
9
Deff;2 (m2 s
1 ) 2.91 · 10
9 3.37 · 10
9 3.61 · 10
9 3.72 · 10
9 3.62 · 10
9 4.45 · 10
9
Deff;1 ––effective diffusion coefficient in the first falling rate period; Deff;2 ––effective diffusion coefficient in the second falling rate period.
102 D. Veli
c et al. / Journal of Food Engineering 64 (2004) 97–102
The average Deff increased with airflow rate, and
ranged form 1.7 · 10
9 to 3.0 · 10
9 m2 s
1 for the first
and from 2.9 · 10
9 to 4.4 · 10
9 m2 s
1 for the second
falling rate period.
With the increase of the airflow velocity, heat transfer
coefficient increased too, and it ranged between 21.4 and
44.3 W m
2 K
1 .
During rehydratation of dried apples, 63.80–79.25%
of water removed by the drying process was returned.
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