Auger Design for Uniform Unloading of Granular Material: I. Rectangular Cross-section Containers

Design equations were developedfor two auger configurations that for practical purposes generate uniform vertical flow of granular material through containers or boxes having a rectangular cross-section. Both configurations have uniform outside diameters so the simple geometry of the conventional U-trough housings could be used with these augers. One configuration had a uniform pitch for the auger flighting and decreasing inside diameter. The other had a uniform inside diameter and a decreasing pitch of the flighting with distance from the outlet end of the auger. Both configurations dramatically improved the uniformity offlow over the conventional auger. However, confidence intervals (a = 0.01) generally indicated that flows were significantly different from an "ideal" uniform flow along the length ofthe augers.