UHT Heat Exchanger with Meandering Pipe Sections for Cereal Suspension
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing UHT systems face challenges in producing a drinkable mixture with a high cereal content, such as rice or oats, due to issues like viscosity increase, clogging, and uneven distribution, which affects the sensory properties and sedimentation of the cereal in the carrier liquid.
Innovation Solution
A method involving a continuous, unbranched pipe flow through a UHT system with meandering pipe sections and controlled temperature profiles to maintain cereal suspension and minimize mechanical stress, ensuring even distribution and preventing sedimentation by adjusting residence times and flow velocities.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Quantity of substance
If the cereal content in the carrier liquid is increased beyond 6% by weight, then the nutritional value and sensory properties of the drinkable mixture are improved, but the mixture becomes highly viscous and prone to clogging in the heat exchanger
Solution Approach 1:
The heat exchanger tube is segmented into multiple sections with varying diameters. The tube starts with a larger diameter at the dosing point to accommodate high cereal content, then transitions through intermediate sections with decreasing diameters, and ends with a smaller diameter section. This segmentation allows the system to handle high cereal content without clogging by providing sufficient flow area where needed while maintaining adequate flow velocity throughout.
Solution Approach 2:
Different sections of the heat exchanger tube have different local qualities in terms of diameter and flow characteristics. The larger diameter sections are located where cereal dosing occurs and where the mixture is most viscous, while smaller diameter sections are located where the mixture has been heated and becomes more fluid. This local adaptation of tube dimensions optimizes flow conditions at each stage of the heating process.
2Reliability
If the cereal grains swell and release starch during heat treatment, then the cooking process is effective, but the carrier liquid becomes more viscous and the mixture is prone to clogging
Solution Approach 1:
The heat exchanger is designed with a larger diameter section at the beginning (dosing point) where cereal is introduced to the carrier liquid. This preliminary larger diameter accommodates the full cereal content before swelling occurs, preventing clogging during the initial mixing phase. As the mixture progresses through the heat exchanger and cereal grains swell and release starch, the tube diameter gradually decreases, maintaining adequate flow velocity despite the increasing viscosity.
3Object-generated harmful factors
If the heat exchanger tube diameter is reduced to maintain flow velocity, then clogging is reduced, but the mechanical stress on cereal grains increases causing them to break down
Solution Approach 1:
The tube is divided into multiple diameter sections rather than using a single small diameter throughout. The larger initial diameter sections protect cereal grains from excessive mechanical stress during dosing and early heating, while the gradual transition to smaller diameter sections maintains flow velocity and prevents clogging in the later stages of heating when the mixture has been processed and is more suitable for higher velocity flow.
4Object-generated harmful factors
If a monotube heat exchanger is used to handle high cereal content, then clogging susceptibility is reduced, but rheological and thermal problems arise in design and operation
Solution Approach 1:
The heat exchanger tube diameter varies dynamically along its length rather than remaining constant. This dynamic design allows the tube to provide larger flow area where the mixture is most viscous (at the beginning) and progressively reduce the flow area as the mixture is heated and becomes less viscous. This dynamic adaptation simplifies operation by maintaining adequate flow conditions throughout the heating process without requiring complex external control mechanisms.
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This approach allows for the production of a drinkable mixture with increased cereal content, maintaining sensory properties and preventing sedimentation, while ensuring aseptic conditions and cost-effective operation.
Implementation Method 1
UHT systems are known which can produce a drinkable mixture... under aseptic conditions... UHT: ultra-high temperature
Implementation Method 2
the sedimentation must be counteracted by sufficient, repeated flow impulses
Implementation Method 3
a heat transfer medium in an outer channel surrounded by an outer jacket acts on the outside of this heat exchanger tube, preferably in countercurrent
Data Source
Figure 1
Figure 2~3
AI summary
The invention relates to methods and to a device for producing a drinkable mixture (M) from a carrier liquid (TF) and at least one cereal (Z), preferably a solid-like, particulate, and swellable cereal, and/or other small-sized admixtures under aseptic conditions. The problem addressed by the invention is to specify a method and a device of the type defined above that produce, in particular, a drinkable mixture from drinking milk as a carrier liquid and rice and/or oats as a cereal or cereals and by means of which the content of the at least one cereal is increased beyond the extent hitherto achieved in the prior art, the desired properties that can be sensorily experienced, such as perceptible lumpiness and even distribution of the admixtures, are ensured, the use of virgin, commonly available cereals is enabled, and sedimentation of the cereal and/or of the admixtures is prevented. This problem is solved, among other things, by means of a method in which an unbranched pipe flow (RS) in the respective sub-regions of a UHT heat treatment (VW; VE, HE, HH, K) is broken down into a group of pipe-flow sections (rs1; rs2) strung together in a meandering manner and remains unbranched as a pipe flow (RS), and in which, following the objective of preventing sedimentation of the at least one cereal (Z) and/or of the admixtures in the region of the pre-swelling (VQ), an average first dwell time (t1) of the mixtures (G) in associated first pipe-flow sections (rs1) in the region of the pre-swelling (VQ) is shorter than an average second dwell time (t2) in associated second pipe-flow sections (rs2) in the region of the final swelling (EQ) and the subsequent regions of the heat treatment (W).