Experiment and modelling of the mixing power consumption in a stirred tank with wet‐particles

Abstract The mixing power is important in the design of stirred tanks. However, the determination of mixing power consumption when stirring wet‐particles is still not clear due to their complex flow. In this work, the effects of the relative liquid volume, material filling height, particle size, agitation speed, and impeller type on the mixing power consumption stirring wet‐particles are experimentally studied. Results show that with the increase of moisture content, the mixing power can reach the maximum value when the relative liquid volume is around 0.2. It is also found that the flow of wet‐particles shows similar behaviour of pseudoplastic fluid in stirred tanks, and a rheological model of the wet‐particles was established, together with the yield stress of the wet‐particles. Ultimately, a predictive power consumption model is proposed based on the dimensional analysis.