Experimental design of Crystallization processes using classical method

Abstract

Crystallization has become one of the most important unit operations in the sugar cane processing. The need to reduce the time from product discovery to market introduction is an inherent concern. In order to achieve the prescribed product quality characteristics, the process of engineering experimentation has to be optimized. Therefore, an experimental design method for crystallization processes is presented in this paper. The usage of Classical approach Design of Experiments from the designing steps until the analyzing phase from the experiment was used. The data obtained from the experiments were analyzed using version 7 of Design-Expert software. In this study, Design of Experiment 23 layout used is used and the parameters determined were the seed volume (c.c.), seeding time (sec.) and seeding Brix (ºBrix). These parameters used to analyze the setting required for optimizing the process variables in crystallization to gain the best combination. The responses measured were the Mean Aperture (MA) and Coefficient Variance (CV). The best run for both responses was done by using the setting of 400 c.c.(seed volume), 3 seconds (seeding time) and 79°Brix (seeding Brix). The estimated optimum value for MA was 1.03 mm while for CV was 31. The yield produced was 23.14 tonnes and the profits gain by the company was about RM 34,710.