Experimental Design for the Propagation of Smoldering Fires in Corn Powder and Cornflour

Abstract

Corn is an example of an agricultural grain with a specific combustibility level and can promote smoldering fires during storage. This paper conducts an experimental design to numerically evaluate how three parameters, namely particle size, moisture, and air ventilation, influence the smoldering velocity. The work methodology is based on Minitab’s experimental design, which defined the number of experiments. First, a pile of corn is heated by a hot plate and a set of thermocouples registers all temperature variations. Then, a full-factorial experiment is implemented in Minitab to analyze the smoldering, which provides a mathematical equation to represent the smoldering velocity. The results indicate that particle size is the most influential factor in the reaction, with 35% and 45% variation between the dried and wet samples. Moreover, comparing the influence of moisture between corn flour and corn powder samples, a variation of 19% and 31% is observed; additionally, analyzing the ventilation as the only variant, we noticed variations of 15% and 17% for dried and wet corn flour, and 27% and 10% for dried and wet corn powder. Future studies may use the experimental design of this work to standardize the evaluation methodology and more effectively evaluate the relevant influencing factors.

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“…The first one was in direct contact with the hot plate, the next one was placed at 0.5 cm, and the others every 3 cm along the vertical centerline of the sample (Figure 5). In the experiments, the hot plate was heated for 1 h until it reached a predeterminate temperature of 360 • C, then allowed to cool to room temperature for 1 h. The evolution was also visualized during the experiments with an infrared camera, and images were taken every 5 min [35,36]. Smoldering velocity was evaluated based on the temperature recorded by the thermocouples by determining the times at which each thermocouple positions reach a temperature of 270 • C.…”

“…experiments with an infrared camera, and images were taken every 5 min [35,36]. Smoldering velocity was evaluated based on the temperature recorded by the thermocouples by determining the times at which each thermocouple positions reach a temperature of 270 °C.…”