Sierra-Vega, Nobel O.

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    Development of an empirical model to predict the mean residence time in a tablet press feeder
    (2017) Sierra-Vega, Nobel O.; Méndez-Román, Rafael; College of Engineering; Acevedo Rullan, Aldo; Romañach, Rodolfo; Department of Chemical Engineering; Marcelo Suarez, Oscar
    The die filling process is a continuous operation that is crucial to comply with the specifications and quality attributes of a pharmaceutical tablet. Die filling is usually performed using a rotary tablet press that has a force-feeding device, called feed frame. The operating conditions of the feed frame can affect the properties of the tablet. The die disc speed (tableting speed), and paddle wheel speed are adjusted empirically to meet with the desired specifications. An experimental investigation was carried out to study the pharmaceutical powder dynamic inside the feed frame and to develop an empirical model to predict the mean residence time in a tablet press feeder, having the feed frame paddle wheel speed, die disc speed and the properties of the materials as model parameters. This model is needed to optimize the die filling operation. Pulse injection method and sampling at feed frame output was used to study the residence time distribution. Five Near Infrared calibration models were developed to determine the concentration of unknown samples. The Taylor dispersion model was used to fit the experimental data. Based on the fit, mean residence time and mean centered variance were calculated. The performance of a reproducibility study of experimental method resulted in a 3.429% of relative standard deviation. The relationship between the experimental factors and mean residence time were examined. The results showed that paddle wheel speed, die disc speed and the properties of the materials affect significantly the mean residence time. The empirical model shows a linear relationship between the mean residence time and the paddle wheel speed, as well as the mean residence time and the die disc speed. However, the model indicates a non-linear relationship with the cohesion parameter, the selected property of the materials. Six independent experiments in which operating conditions and the cohesion parameter were controlled and varied were performed to validate the empirical model. Overall, the predicted mean residence time has a high correlation with the observed experimental results, finding error percentages between 0.50% and 3.12% for the validations performed.