Optimization of Flat-Plate Solar Air Heater for Drying Mangifera Indica by Using Karush Kuhn Tucker (KKT) Conditions

Abstract

The increase of the world demographic distribution makes the continuous and large-scale production of food necessary. Some of these are perishable fruits and vegetables, whose handling times between harvest and consumption should be short. In order to reduce the amount of food wasted in storage and distribution stages, the implementation of a dehydrator system is proposed. This kind of systems regulates the airflow and the air temperature in closed and controlled environments with the aim of extracting the food moisture in order to preserve it for longer periods. With the arrival of alternative energies and their multiple applications, this works presents the design and the development of a system for drying tropical fruits, specifically Mangifera Indica, using the sun as primary source of energy in flat solar collector in order to replace the electrical consumption of conventional drying equipment, offering an alternative in areas with limited access to the electricity network. In addition, optimization algorithms have been used to compute the mechanical design parameters, and six designs with manufacturing variations have been compared, obtaining as max outlet temperature a value of 66 °C.