A STUDY OF THE PERFORMANCE OF A MODIFIED V-SHAPED SOLIDS MIXER USING SEGREGATING MATERIALS

A binary free-flowing mixture made up of 30% salt and 70% non-pareil seeds was used as a mixing model. The performance of the mixer was defined in terms of relative standard deviation from the measured mean and the percent of the discharge profile within a 5% limit. The variables investigated in the present study included the leg reduction (0, 10, 20, 40 and 60%), offset angle (0, 15, 30, 45, 60, 75 and 90-degrees), mixing time (0, 1, 5, 10, 15 and 30 min) and any combination of the afore-mentioned variables. The study confirms that the V-shaped blender can be improved upon by using an uneven leg (10-20% reduction) and an offset angle (15-degrees). A combination of a 40% leg reduction and 75 or 90-degrees offset angle gave the best results and that of a 0% leg reduction and 90-degrees offset angle produced the worst results.