Drying and Agglomeration of Skim Milk Powder by a Vibro-fluidized Bed

The fluidized bed is combined with a spray dryer in milk powder processing in order to improve the thermal efficiency and the properties of powder, such as moisture content, dispersibility and solubility. The purpose of this study was collection of data to design and develop the large-scale equipment. The holdup, rates of entrainment, agglomeration and drying of powder were investigated under several conditions. The amount of residue in the product powder from the fluidized bed is about one-tenth of that in the feed powder.