Numerical Simulation of Granular Mixing in Conical Mixer with Different Angles Using Discrete Element Method

Abstract

Granular mixing process is necessary for operation in many industries such as food, pharmaceutical and cosmetic industries. Although the mixing materials are almost the first stage in the production process, it can affect the quality and cost of the final product. They are choosing a suitable mixer that may reduce cost and energy consumption. A static mixer is a device widely used to mix materials in industries. Because the mixing phenomena are very complex, a proper static mixer design still needs to be studied. In this work, we simulate the mixing pro-cess of granular materials in a conical mixer. We assume the two types of gran-ular solid with the same size flowing in the mixer. The discrete Element Method (DEM) is applied to obtain numerical solutions in the mathematical model. This work aims to use a coordinate mixing index to compare the effectiveness of mixing from the conical mixers with different angles, including 15o, 30o, 45o, and 60o. The results show that the highest coordinate mixing number occurs in the mixer with an angle . These imply that it is the best mixing quality.