On the Cooling Rates of Agricultural Products (I)

Abstract

A knowledge of thermal characteristics of agricultural products is important in applications where the product is subjected heating, drying, cooling and freezing.
Cooling may greatly reduce deterioration of fruits and vegetables between harvest and consumption.
Cooling rates as related to hydrocooling and aircooling for a number of products were measured. This paper presents the experimental results and a review of some of the basic researeh previously or presently accomplished.
The specific conclusions regarding the cooling rates of products used for this investigation are;
1) Cooling curves of the agricultural products approximately give the forms of exponential functions.
2) Proper cooling times of the above kind products may be appropriate to be inferred from the data which are treated with halfcooling method.
3) When the flow rates in the cooling units' chamber or tank are about natural convection currnt, hydrocooling method is twice or more effective than air cooling method.
4) From the only standpoint of the cooling rate, hydrocooling method may be suitable to precooling of fruit kind products.