Breakage functions of particles of four different materials subjected to uniaxial compression

Particle breakage is a common problem in the conveying and handling of particulate solids. The phenomenon of particle breakage has been studied by experiments by a number of researchers in order to describe the process of breakage by mathematical functions. The development of comminution functions that can suitably describe the breakage behaviour of granular materials can lead to a significant improvement in the design and efficiency of particulate solids handling equipment. The present study focuses on developing the strength distribution and the breakage functions of particles of four different materials subjected to uniaxial compressive loading. The determination of particle strength is an important aspect in studying particle breakage as it determines whether a particle will break under an applied force. Single particles were compressed until fracture in order to determine their strength. The strength of the particles is expressed in terms of force in this study as it can be directly obtained from the experiments. Using the crushing force data from the experiments, strength distributions of the particles were plotted and described by a statistical function. Tests were also conducted to investigate the size distribution of the fragments formed after breakage. The sizes of the fragments were measured using optical microscopy. Based on the size distribution of the fragments, breakage functions were developed for the materials.