Studies on segregation of binary mixture of solids in a continuous fast fluidized bed

Abstract

Experimental investigations on the continuous fast fluidized bed were extended for size segregation of binary mixture of solids in the column with air as the separation medium [1]. The feed is either jetsam-rich or flotsam-rich binary mixture of particles of different size, but same density. The variables tested were superficial gas velocity, solids feed rate and feed characteristics. At steady state, there exists physical equilibrium between the evolved flotsam and the residual jetsam when the granular solids are in fluid-like state as in the case of density segregation of solids [1]. Using the analogy of the binary liquid mixtures separation by distillation, the phase diagram was constructed from the experimental observations. The effect of solids feed rate, feed composition, particle size ratio and particle size on equilibrium distribution of the flotsam and jetsam were presented.