Análise da transferência de calor em defumadores de alimentos

Abstract

Smoking process shows numerous variables that need to be monitored to ensure the good quality of the smoked product. The temperature and the flow of the smoke are examples of variables that influence the properties of the product. The excess or lack of drying of the product and the poor distribution of the smoke inside the smoker’s chamber, are examples of problems that cause economic damage as they negatively influence the organoleptic properties of the final product. For this reason, this work presents the modeling and simulation of the food smoking process, through computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to monitor the temperature and the flow rate of the pyrolysis smoke. It was considered a two-dimensional, single-phase and transient flow. Three domains were also considered, one for heating smoke (combustion), one for smoking smoke (pyrolysis) and one object domain (pork). The results obtained were compared to the experimental data of Sebastian et al. (2005). In this way, the modeling and results showed themselves as adequate, thus making this study a viable way for the development and optimization of the smoking process through computational fluid dynamics.