Construção e teste de um secador solar e de um Picnômetro de comparação a ar para a secagem e a determinação da porosidade de grãos

Abstract

Brazil, over the last decades, has been consolidating its leadership as one of the main food producers in the world. The fact is that the country is already the third largest producer of corn in the world after the United States and China. Due to its relevance, the treatment in the pre-processing of this cereal becomes a fundamental step to guarantee a product with high quality. Drying is considered the step with the highest energy expenditure in grain production, and is usually carried out with the burning of biomass, such as firewood, for example. From a financial point of view, drying grains remains expensive and unfeasible for small farmers. The objective of this work was to build and test two equipment used in the pre-processing of agricultural products. Build and test a household-level solar dryer for drying agricultural products; to build and test an air comparison pycnometer for the determination of intergranular porosity of agricultural products. Obtained the results, it was possible to verify that the solar dryer can be used for the drying of agricultural products and that the pycnometer presented porosity values above the value measured by the fluid addition method. The cost of making the equipment was R$ 1.202,01 and R$ 1.305,83 and in the drying simulation it was verified that the solar drying conditions were favorable and the variations in the shape and size of grains and the pycnometer presented porosity values above the measured value.