Studies on the Effect of Moisture Content and Coarse and Fine Particle Concentration on Segregation in Bins

Previous work by the author1-4) on particle size segregation in bins has been extended to consider the effect of the concentration of coarse particles. At low coarse concentrations a simplification can be achieved by plotting the non-dimensional concentration of coarse material C/CF to summarise the profile. The present study reveals that at high values of CF, the coarse feed concentration, the segregation pattern is highly dependent on CF. The addition of small amounts (less than 1 %) of water to feed mixtures has a profound influence on segregation behaviour in many cases smoothing what would otherwise be severe segregation patterns with dry materials. Previous study contained speculation that segregation was reduced because the water caused an increase in cohesion of the fines content of the feed which in turn slowed the progress of coarse material relative to fine. Further discussion of this phenomenon is provided here.