Rice dryer study earns award

Ramchandra Bhandari received the VDI Förderpreis 2007 award for his master’s thesis on the evaluation of rice husk–fueled box-type paddy dryers in South Sumatra, Indonesia. Mr. Bhandari’s study was supported by Mr. Budi Raharjo of the Agricultural Institute of Assessment Technology (AIAT) in Palembang, the South Sumatra Forest Fire Management Project (SSFFMP) led by Dr. Karl Heinz Steinmann, Mr. Djoko Setijono, Mr. Gerald Hitzler, and IRRC Postproduction Work Group leader Martin Gummert. VDI or “The Association of German Engineers” is a nonprofit organization of 132,000 engineers and natural scientists. Founded in 1856, the VDI is Western Europe’s largest engineering association today.

Ramchandra Bhandari measures the temperature of the grain loaded into the box-type paddy dryer.

In South Sumatra, the first box-type paddy dryer (also called flat-bed dryer) with 3.3-ton capacity and rice husk furnace was installed in 2004 at a farmers’ cooperative in Upang Village by the AIAT with support from the SSFFMP. Because the mechanical dryer produced better-quality milled rice than traditional sun drying, more than 30 mechanical dryers have been installed by private users in Muliasari, Upang, and Upangceria. The individual drying capacity of each dryer varies from 3.5 to 10 tons of harvested paddy per batch, accounting for a total drying capacity of about 214.5 tons per batch.

The study assessed the performance of the dryers, determined the effect of mechanical drying on rice quality, and assessed its economic viability. It also aimed to compare rice quality from mechanical dryers with that from traditional sun drying.

The experiments were done in April 2007. Three box dryers were chosen and a total of eight experiments were carried out with commercial operation of the dryers using the operators’ paddy. Key parameters were measured every hour and were used to compare the box dryers with sun drying in terms of drying performance, rice quality, and economics of drying.
In terms of head rice, under the same working conditions of the milling unit, the quality of rice from the box dryer was always higher than that from sun drying.

Mechanical drying also yielded more whole grains (grains larger than 85% of full size) than sun drying. In South Sumatra markets, the separation of whole grains from broken grains is one of the most important economic indicators in determining the selling price of rice. Milled rice from mechanical dryers also commanded a higher price than sun-dried rice.
The study concluded that the milling yields of box-dried and sun-dried paddy did not differ significantly. However, paddy dried in a box dryer had better quality than that from sun-dried paddy. The study recommends using the box dryer to increase farmers’ profit when they sell their high-quality rice, provided that there is a market for it and that operating conditions are good.
 

Trina Mendoza (adapted from a report by M. Gummert, R. Bhandari, and H. Gaese)

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