Performance Evaluation of a Forced Convection Solar Drier with Evacuated Tube Collector for Drying Amla

A forced convection solar drier is designed with evacuated tube collector and a blower. The performance of the designed drier is evaluated by carrying drying experiments at Thanjavur District, Tamilnadu, India with amla. Solar drying of amla is carried at different air velocity flow rates – 4m/s, 4.25m/s and 4.5m/s and is compared with natural sun drying. The temperature of the drying chamber ranges from 53oC to 82oC while the ambient temperature ranges from 29oC to 32oC. The efficiency of the designed drier varies from 38.61% to 43.7% where as the efficiency of sun drying varies from 12.5% to 14.15%. It is observed that the efficiency of the drier increases with increase in air velocity flow rates. Initial moisture content of amla ranges between 83.6% and 84.3% and the equilibrium moisture content ranges between 0.1% and 0.6%. Solar drying takes 5 to 7 hours to reach safe moisture content where as sun drying takes 13 to15 hours. Also the quality of solar dried amla is better in terms of colour, odour, flavour and appearance than the sun dried amla. The observed result of the present work shows that the proposed solar drier is good for drying amla in this region. Keyword-Forced convection, Evacuated tube collector, Solar drier, Amla, Efficiency, Moisture content, Quality