Development of an Energy Efficient Portable Convective Fish-Dryer

Abstract

A portable multipurpose electrical dryer of 10 kg capacity was designed and developed for drying of fishe and other agricultural products. The dryer consists of a drying chamber with total drying area of 2.8 square metres , fan, heating element and exhaust vent. The dryer was fabricated using locally sourced materials. Under ‘no-load’ conditions, the drying chamber attained highest temperature of 50±5°C within 60 min of operation. Relative humidity and velocity of drying air inside the drying chamber were observed to be 65% and 0.8 m/s respectively. The study of energy consumption pattern indicated a drying efficiency of 21.42%. A performance evaluation study of the dryer was done for sardine and the maximum drying time required for complete drying was eight hours. Results showed that the entire drying processes occurred under falling rate period. A logarithmic model fitted to the drying data very well for the specified range of drying conditions.