Heat transfer in a horizontal rotary drum reactor

The heating of carbohydrates (particle size 15 – 100 μm) has been studied in an industrial scale horizontal drum reactor. The drum was 9.0 m long and had a diameter of 0.6 m. Strips were mounted on the inside wall and the drum was heated externally by steam. Solid movement in the drum was observed in a transparent experimental segment of the drum. From these experiments it became clear that the heat transfer between wall and solids may be described by the penetration model. In separate experiments the product of the effective thermal conductivity of the bulk material and its heat capacity has been determined. The theoretical heat transfer coefficients agree quite well with the experimental values verified by heat transfer measurements in the large-scale drum.The heat transfer coefficients between wall and gas phase and between bulk solid and gas phase have also been measured. The magnitude of the heat transfer coefficient between wall and gas phase indicates a natural convection mechanism.