Attrition of granola as a function of manufacturing process parameters during fluidised bed granulation and subsequent pneumatic conveying

The present study examines the breakage of particulate granola produced by fluidised bed granulation during pneumatic conveying process. Granola was pneumatically conveyed in a purpose built conveying rig designed to mimic product conveying and packaging. Three different conveying rig configurations were employed: a straight pipe, a rig consisting two 45^o bends and one with a 90^o bend. Particle breakage increases with applied pressure drop, and a 90^o bend pipe results in more attrition for all conveying velocities relative to other pipe geometry. In terms of the fluidised bed granulation, there was no single operating parameter that was deemed to have a significant effect on breakage during subsequent conveying. A simple power law breakage model based on process input parameters was developed to describe aggregate breakage during pneumatic conveying.