الفهرس 
INTRODUCTIONOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
The problem of increasing human population in Egypt must be faced with increasing animal products. Mixing of powders is very common operation in the feed industry and represents a critical unit operation of the production process of both mash and pellets forms. In this study a horizontal batch mixer was developed and evaluated to improve the mixing homogeneity in feed processing. It operates at several speeds and has large impellers, which sweep the whole vessel to mix mash components. The developed mixer was evaluated within studying the effects of some engineering and operating parameters on the mixing homogeneity, energy consumption and operation cost. These parameters include mixing time (3, 6, 9, and 12 min.), mixer speed (1.05, 1.28, 1.51, and 1.73 m.s-1) and blade setting angle (30, 45 and 60 degree). The results indicated that increasing the time more than 6 min had a negative effect on the process under blade setting angle of 30 degree, which caused component segregation and increased energy consumption and operation cost. While using blade setting angle of 45 and 60 degree causing component segregation when mixing time exceeded than 9 minutes. To achieve an adequate mixing homogeneity, mixing time has not to exceed of 3 minutes, blade setting angle 30º and mixing speed should be equal to 1.05 m.s-1 to avoid extra cost in energy consumption. Based on the experimental results, the best mixing homogeneity of 99 % with specific energy consumption of 2.624 kW.h.Mg-1 by using the mixer under mixing speed of 1.05 m.s-1, mixing time of 3 min. and blade setting angle of 30 degree.