Heat and mass transfer in the process of heat treatment and drying of natural leather with the convective method of energy supply

Abstract

In the work, the authors investigated the possibility of using the results of analytical solutions of the linear differential equations of unsteady heat conduction with constant heat transfer coefficients to calculate the temperature of the material during heat treatment of leathers. Heat treatment of natural leathers as heat-sensitive materials is carried out under mild temperature conditions and high air moisture contents, the temperature does not undergo significant changes, and the heat transfer coefficients change almost linearly. When using analytical solutions, the authors made the assumptions that for small temperature gradients over the cross section of a thin body, the thermal transfer of matter can be neglected and for values of the heat and mass transfer Biot criteria less than unity, the main factor, limiting heat and mass transfer, is the interaction of the evaporation surface of the body with the environment; so, in solving the differential heat equation we can restrict ourselves to one first member of an infinite series. In this case, a piecewise stepwise approximation of all thermophysical characteristics with constant values of these coefficients at the calculated time intervals was applied, which made it possible to take into account the change in the transfer coefficients throughout the entire heat treatment process. Processing of experimental data showed that in low-intensity processes with reliable values of the transfer coefficients, it is possible to use the results of solutions of differential equations of unsteady heat conduction in heat transfer calculations. The results of the study of heat transfer during drying of leather confirm the laws of temperature change established experimentally. Together with experimental studies of drying processes, analytical studies are of great practical importance in the development of new methods for calculating heat and mass transfer in wet bodies.