THE USE OF DEM SIMULATION FOR CONFIRMING THE PROCESS OF PARTICULATE MATERIAL MIXING

Abstract

At the present time in the research of particulate materials, computer methods that work independently with individual particles are coming to the forefront. One such method is the Discrete Element Method – DEM, which is already widely used. Its usage, however, is complex, mostly due to the input data – what the properties of the researched material are, plus their interaction in processes. And despite the progress, it is still always necessary to validate the experimental equipment and to verify the individual simulations by an experimental measuring or by theoretical knowledge. This study focuses on the verification of the simulation of the mixing of a particulate material with the help of the DEM method, whereby simulations are compared with an experimental measurement and theoretic calculations. The theoretical calculation was carried out by the Novosad model, while the experimental material was granulated polyethylene with strictly defined mechanical-physical properties.