The effect of rotational speed of the drum on physical properties of granulated compost fertilizer

Granulation is one of the fundamental operations in particulate processing which has an ancient history and a widespread use. Compost fertilizer was granulated using drum granulation method under different level of drum rotational speed. Rotational speed of the drum (ω) ranged from 40 to 60 rev min–1 (40, 45, 50, 55 and 60 rev min–1). The effect of rotational speed of the drum (ω) on some physical properties of granulated compost fertilizer including: useful granules, granules size, fracture force, mass of the granules, bulk density, angle of friction and angle of repose are investigated in the present study.Results indicated that with the increasing drum rotational speedthe percentage of useful granules, fracture force, bulk density, angle of friction and angle of reposeincrease from 69.91% to 80.88%, 34.35 N to 35.23 N, 743.23 to 765.08 kg m–3, 26.50 to 28.01º and 10.83 to 12.88º, respectively. Also the average size of granules decreases from10.15 to 7.05 mm.