THREE-DIMENSIONAL SIMULATION OF ISOTHERMAL WOOD DRYING OF RADIATA PINE USING EFFECTIVE DIFFUSION COEFFICIENTS

Salinas, CH; Gatica, YA; Vargas, HA; Ananias, RA

Abstract

The objective of the present work was to simulate three-dimensional drying of wood, based on the concept of the effective diffusion coefficient. For this, we used a conventional drying process of radiata pine in a controlled environment (dry and wet bulb temperatures of 44 and 36 degrees C, respectively). This experiment allowed us to gather data on: a) the spatial distribution of moisture content at different drying times, b) the drying curve, and c) the surface emission coefficient. A differential, partial, non-linear, second-order mathematical model was used, and the exponential functions of the effective diffusion coefficient characterized the three-dimensional orthotropic (radial, tangential, and longitudinal) transport of moisture content in the wood. This mathematical model was integrated numerically through the control volume finite element method, which contemplates: a) tetrahedral elements for discretization, b) implicit Euler method for the time differential, and c) Gauss-Seidel with successive over-relaxation method to resolve the linear equation system. We compared these results for the three-dimensional spatial distributions of moisture content after 22, 44, 66, and 88 (h) of drying, and the resulting drying curves were in good agreement with the experiments.

Más información

Título según WOS: THREE-DIMENSIONAL SIMULATION OF ISOTHERMAL WOOD DRYING OF RADIATA PINE USING EFFECTIVE DIFFUSION COEFFICIENTS
Título de la Revista: LATIN AMERICAN APPLIED RESEARCH
Volumen: 43
Número: 1
Editorial: PLAPIQUI(UNS-CONICET)
Fecha de publicación: 2013
Página de inicio: 95
Página final: 102
Idioma: English
Notas: ISI