HARD CANDIES COOLING. MODELLING THE OPERATING CONDITIONS TAKING INTO ACCOUNT HEAT TRANSFER COEFFICIENT AND EXPERIMENTAL VALUES OF THE PHYSICAL PROPERTIES

MARÍA AGUSTINA REINHEIMER; GUSTAVO ALBERTO PÉREZ

Recife, Brasil

Congreso; XVII Congreso Brasilero de Ingeniería Química (XVII COBEQ); 2008

Departamento de Engenharia Química (DEQ) da Universidade Federal de Pernambuco (UFPE), em parceria com a Associação Brasileira de Engenharia Química (ABEQ)

This research study arises as a consequence of operating troubles on a sweet industry in its hard candies production line.  It has been detected that a part of non-conforming products percentage of this line (hard candies with splinters, broken, misshapen or sticky between them) was because the process parameters in the cooling step have not been standardized and also variations were recorded in the different lots. Only a careful control of the process conditions coupled to a deep knowledge of the material properties could avoid the undesired effects. A mathematical model of the process was developed to simulate it and try to find the best process variables combination for the desired product quality. This tool will be useful to know a priori the effects in the required product quality at the end of this process step in the presence of any variable modification.