Performance evaluation of solar dehaydrator for excess produce [manuscript]
| dc.contributor.author | Arvin Jay B. Jimenez | |
| dc.date.accessioned | 2025-09-26T01:17:10Z | |
| dc.date.available | 2025-09-26T01:17:10Z | |
| dc.date.issued | 2019 | |
| dc.description.abstract | The general objective of the study was to evaluate the performance of solar dehydrator for excess produce (SDEP). The study also aimed to: (1) evaluate the SDEP in terms of air flow, heat energy, temperature and relative humidity; (2) evaluate the SDEP in terms of drying rate, drying time, and moisture content reduction; and (3) perform a simple cost analysis. The study was conducted at the Institute for Climate Change and Environmental Management, Central Luzon State University, Science City of Muñoz, Nueva Ecija, Philippines from April-May 2019. The machine efficiently captured the heat of the sun anytime of the day. The color was made black to enhance its heat absorption capacity. Also, solar panel was installed to run the exhaust fan without using any electricity. Inside the drying chamber was composed of three drying trays. The drying process was done from 8:00am to 5:00pm everyday until the weight of the samples became constant. Results revealed that the airflow of SDEP was 9.55 m/s and the total amount of heat was 457.98 W. In terms of mositure content, okra has the highest moisture content having 11.42 grams of water per gram of dry solid gw/gs, followed by mushroom having 7.75 gw/gs and onion which has 7.17 gw/gs. The samples were dried up to 0.14 gw/gs for onion, 0.13 gw/gs for mushroom and 0.11 gw/gs for okra. The commodities were dried 20% faster using the solar dehaydrate with an average drying rate of 98.71%hr compared to the traditional method which was the open air sun drying. While the average drying rate of an open air sun drying was 88.08%hr. The average drying time of onion was 13.89 hours, 5.89 hours for mushroom and 10 hours for okra. All dried samples were brought to CLSU-AFTBI to test water activity. The dried samples using solar dehaydrator had an average of 0.390 while the samples that were dried an open air hot an average of 0.376. Therefore, frying using SDEP is safe microbial growth. The computed fixed cost and variable cost of SDEP were Php 8,645/yr and Php 29,970, respectively. The total cost of drying of was Php 268.16/kg while the breakeven point was 11.81 kg/year. | |
| dc.identifier.uri | http://granarium.clsu.edu.ph/handle/123456789/583 | |
| dc.language.iso | en | |
| dc.relation.supervisor | MARVIN M. CINENSE | |
| dc.title | Performance evaluation of solar dehaydrator for excess produce [manuscript] | |
| dc.type | Thesis |