On the Mass Flow Rate of Granular Material in Silos with Lateral Exit Holes

Abstract

The mass flow rate, \( \dot{m} \), associated with the outflow of dry, cohesionless granular material through orifices located in vertical walls of silos was analyzed experimentally in order to reveal the dependence of this quantity on D and w, i.e., the diameter of the orifice and the wall’s thickness, respectively. A series of experiments enable us to give a general correlation, which has the form \( \dot{m} = \dot{m}_{0} - wA, \) where A is a constant and \( \dot{m}_{0} \) is the mass flow rate to the minimum allowable wall thickness.