School of Chemical Engineering

Particulate Processes

Storage and Flow of Powder

Part 1
Bulk Material Handling
Material Characteristics
Outline
Storage and Flow of Powder
1.1 Introduction
1.2 Bulk material handling
1.3 System selection criteria
1.4 Material characteristics
2.1 Powder storage
2.2 Powder flow characteristics
3.1 Powder storage design
3.2 Powder flow properties
4.1 Stresses in storage bins
4.2 Hopper rate of discharge
2
Outline
Storage and Flow of Powder
Part 1
1.1 Introduction
1.2 Bulk material handling
1.3 System selection criteria
1.4 Material characteristics

3
Introduction
• Solid powder is normally a collection of discrete
particles
 may vary in:
 Shape
 Size
 Density
 Chemical composition
 may also be explosible, e.g.
 Coal and wood dust
 Flour & sugar
 Metal dusts, especially aluminium, magnesium, iron
Bulk Material Handling
• Major cost in the chemical, pharmaceutical, minerals, and
food industries
 can be up to 50% of the final cost of the product

• Choice of storage and handling techniques depend on

material characteristics:
 Flowability – free flowing or cohesive
 Purity required and contamination risk
 Flammable, combustible, explosible
 Toxicity
 Others ?
Bulk Material Handling
System selection criteria
• A wide variety of systems and equipment available
 Need to choose the most effective combination for
requirements
• Key considerations:
 Material characteristics
 Quantity to be handled
 Storage capacity
 Transport requirements
 Routing
 Interfacing with other process units
System Selection Criteria
Material characteristics
• Free flowing
 generally easy to handle
 no special precautions required with storage bin design
 tendency to segregate if subjected to movement, vibration
• Cohesive
 generally difficult to very difficult to handle
 special care needed with hopper and bin design
 feeding is very difficult, few designs can cope
• Explosible
 extensive fire and explosion precautions essential
System Selection Criteria
Quantity to be handled
• Storage capacity
 Stockpile or bin/silo storage
 open or enclosed stockpiles
 size and number of bins or silos
• Transport requirements (incl. road, rail & ship)
 Within plant
 belt conveyors, bucket elevators, pneumatic systems
 External
 belt conveyors, truck, train, ship, pipeline
System Selection Criteria
Routing
• Ground level
 Straight with few bends or complex routing
 Junctions and splits
• Elevated
 Climbing or descending in direction of flow
• Number of transfer points
System Selection Criteria
Interfacing with other process units
• Batch feed or continuous feed
• Accuracy control required
 very precise on a second by second basis
 need for accuracy over a longer time scale
Material Characteristics of Powders
• Bulk density (of powder)
• Particle shape
• Surface area
• Flowability
• Moisture content
• Flammability & explosive properties
• Other properties
 hardness, degradability, corrosiveness, toxicity ...

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Material Characteristics
Bulk density (of powder)
• B = total mass /total volume of powder [kg/m3]
= (1 – )p + .g
 : voidage = vol. voids/total vol.
1 –  = c : vol. fraction of solids
• Approximate: B  (1- ) p p : particle density
 neglecting mass of air, g : air density
since p >> g

• Bulk density often varies, dependent on voidage  – function

of treatment history:
 Aerated (aerated or poured bulk density)
 Vibrated (tap bulk density – Standardised BS 3483)
 Consolidated (compressed or compact bulk density)
Bulk Density of Powder – Variable

Hopper: wall angle ≈ 16o; orifice diameter = 21.1 mm

Powder: sand particle diameter = 0.14 – 0.22 mm
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Material Characteristics
Particle shape
• Irregular shapes have significant influence on powder
packing and flow
• Most solid particles are non-spherical
 very difficult to describe with real accuracy or meaning
 only quantitative measure is sphericity:
Surface area of sphere of same volume
  1.0
Surface area of particle
  is measure of deviation from the spherical shape
 microscopic visual or photographic examination is probably the
most useful tool
Particle Shape
Common particle shape descriptions
in terms of Sphericity ()

Descriptor  Examples
Spherical 1.00 glass beads, calibration latex
Rounded 0.82 water worn solids, granules
Cubic 0.806 sugar, calcite
Angular 0.66 crushed minerals
Flaky 0.54 gypsum, talc
Platelet 0.22 clays, kaolin, mica, graphite

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Material Characteristics
Surface area
• Normally measured as specific surface area (as)
 i.e. surface area per unit mass (or per unit volume) of
solid particles
• as increases with decreasing particle size
d2 6  Surface area 
 e.g. spheres of diam. d: aS  3   Volume 
d 6 d
• Materials with high as tend to be more cohesive, less free
flowing
 small particles
 strong inter-particle forces
Material Characteristics
Flowability
• Important in design of storage vessels and feeders
 ranges from free flowing to cohesive
• Free flowing
 dry, coarse granulated materials with low inter-particle
forces
 e.g. sugar, dry sand, alumina …

• Cohesive
 generally fine powders (< 200m) with strong inter-particle
forces forming cohesive structure
 e.g. flour, starch, cocoa powder, icing sugar, wet sand …
Powder Flowability
Angle of repose ()
Maximum angle formed by a free powder
surface with the horizontal Angle of
repose
• Limiting angle of heap surface
 related to angle of poured material 
 not a measure of hopper angle
• Dependent on condition of material

 particle size, PSD
 particle shape
 moisture content
 temperature; electrostatic charge...
• Simple standardised test
Powder Flowability
Angle of repose ()
Sandy
25o - 30o Very free flowing
30o - 40o Free flowing
40o - 45o Flowing
Floury
45o - 55o Cohesive
> 55o Very cohesive
Starchy

• useful qualitative indication of flowability but not an exact

description of material flow characteristics
 cannot be used for design of hopper angle
• cohesive & very cohesive materials are difficult to handle
• complex dependence on size distribution, esp. fines %
Material Characteristics
Moisture content
• Affects flowability of powder
• Can be quoted as “wet basis” or “dry basis”
 Wet basis (wb)
% Moisture = mass of water/total mass of sample  100
 Dry basis (db)
% Moisture = mass of water/mass dry solids  100
• Large difference in values between two bases, especially at
higher moisture levels
• Most laboratory test results are quoted on wet basis
Moisture Content
Two forms of moisture:
• Surface (free) moisture
 water adhering to the surface of the material
 removable by air drying below 100oC
 if water completely fills the voids, material is saturated
• Inherent moisture
 chemically bound water in porous structure
 combined water, e.g. water of crystallisation
 only removed by strong heating 120-1000oC (calcination)
Material Characteristics
Flammability and Explosive properties
• Most carbonaceous dusts and many metal dusts are
flammable and explosible
• High surface area can result in slow oxidation & self heating
 especially coal and wood dusts
• If a flammable dust suspension is ignited
 combustion reaction very rapid due to very large surface area
 violent explosion can result - deflagration
• Must take adequate precautions against fire & explosion
where flammable dusts are handled
Material Characteristics
Flammability and explosive properties

Grain Dust Explosion at Westwood LA in 1977 (36 killed, 9 injured)

Material Characteristics
Flammability and explosive properties

Sugar dust explosion at the Imperial Sugar refinery in Port

Wentworth, GA, USA on February 7, 2008 (14 workers killed)
Material Characteristics
Hardness
• The harder the material the greater the wear on handling
equipment
 especially if the shape is very angular or irregular

Other properties
• Require special considerations:
 Toxicity
 Corrosiveness
 Friable
 Degradable
Material Characteristics
Personality Classification of Powder
Neurotic
• Have poor flowability
• Have too much flowability
• Move awkwardly
• Are sticky or tacky
• Tend to pack or bridge
Sadistic
• Are abrasive
• Are corrosive
• Are toxic
• Attack surroundings
• Are explosive
• Are hot
Masochistic
• Are friable
• Suffer from surroundings
• Are degradable
• Are contaminable
Schizophrenic
• Are hygroscopic
• Change behaviour pattern
• Susceptible to electrostatic
charge