ANALYTICAL DETERMINATION OF THE DRYING CHARACTERISTICS OF CARPET TILES

Carpet manufacturing involves a crucial energy-intensive drying stage at the end of the process to remove the moisture left from dye setting . Determining drying characteristics for carpet tiles, such as tempera ture levels, transition times, total drying times, and evaporation rat es, is vitally important so as to optimize this drying stage. This pap er describes a way to determine the drying characteristics of foam-bac ked carpet tiles using experimental data along with analytical data ge nerated by a computer program developed for this purpose. The computer model is simplified by using a lumped capacitance assumption, neglect ing internal conduction within each layer. The data an later collected in profiles versus time, where the transition point is identified at the point where the mass versus time profile changes slope. Similarly, the total drying time is identified at the point where this profile f lattens. A decrease in the initial moisture and an increase in the ove n temperature predict a decrease in the total drying time, simulating the experimental results. Both the modeling results and results from t he parametric study provide a better understanding of the drying mecha nisms and lead to a series of important recommendations for carpet dry ing optimization.