The Department of Mechanical Engineering of the Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María has recently formed a Research Center for the Transport of Bulk Materials (CITRAM) to study and model the pneumatic conveyance of solid particles of different nature, size and/or density, to identify the different flow patterns developed in the pipeline, and to optimize the basic parameters for design purposes such as minimum conveying velocity and pressure drop.

Results from laboratory scale tests in a 58 mm I.D. pneumatic conveying loop are presented for diverse bulk materials such as: styropor, corn gritz, sugar, salt, fertilizers, lime, fine iron ore and fine copper ore. Also, a novel empirical correlation for the solids friction factor (Ks) as a function of particle size and particle density is proposed for dilute-phase systems.