The first full scale
mesh belt dryer was constructed and tested in Arizona in 1991, these belt dryers used a wire mesh belt dryer and had a continuous support beneath the belt. The continuous support included a single diagonal support beneath the belt, also the belt was extended through a chamber with downdraft drying, that is to say heated dry air was introduced above the cotton and the treated air passed through the cotton to outlets below the cotton. In this case, the supports included a diagonal support extending from one side of the chamber to the other. The edge of the wire belt was supported by a support flange running along the sides of the chamber and was held down by a hold down flange extending above the support flange along the sides of the chamber. The exhaust ducts under the belt had a circular cross section with the inlets into the duct at the bottom. The bottom run of the wire
mesh belt dryer was supported by the bottom of the chamber and a cross conveyor was located near the inlet end of the chamber to remove trash which was moved to that end by the bottom belt dragging along the bottom of the chamber. A second installation was installed in Texas in 1992. The Texas installation did not include any additional features pertinent to this application.
This application discloses certain improvements over the previous two experimental installations. Particularly, improvements have been made to cause more trash to be separated from the fibrous material being handled. This is accomplished by intentionally flexing the one-half by one-half modified wire
mesh belt dryer. The flexing of the belt will result in shaking the material upon the belt, therefore permitting the release of additional trash.
The
mesh belt dryer is flexed sufficiently to cause certain movement of the mass upon the belt without agitating the mass. The normal drying action of the heated air is to be that the heated air flows through the mass of material and not around clumps of the fibrous material. For example: if the flexing of the
mesh belt dryer is so vigorous that seed cotton is separated into individual locks, the air tends to flow around the locks. The seed cotton is dried better if the mass of material remains intact with the air flowing through the locks.
The structure for the
mesh belt dryer includes an elongated drying chamber 10. The drying chamber includes a treated air plenum 12 extending along the entire top 14 of the chamber. The bottom of the plenum 12 is formed by a perforated ceiling 16 to evenly distribute the treated air from the plenum into the main chamber 18.
