Experimental Study on Microwave Drying Characteristics of Granite Slabs

Abstract

Granite slabs are a significant building material, which is widely used in the construction field. An important process in granite slab processing is drying treatment. Currently traditional drying methods such as natural drying and hot air drying have inherent drawbacks such as high energy consumption and low efficiency, which pose higher requirements for drying processes. Herein, a kinetic model of microwave drying for characterizing the variation rule of moisture content in the drying process of granite sheets is established. The effects of microwave power and plate thickness on the drying characteristics of granite slabs are studied through a large number of comparative experiments. On this basis, the variation rule of granite slab moisture ratio during the drying process is further obtained. Experimental results show that microwave drying of granite mainly includes accelerated drying and reduced drying stages, which are consistent with the predicted results of the model. These excellent results prove the effectiveness of the proposed model in this article.