Fluid-Bed Coffee Roaster

Abstract

Coffee beans are a crucial part of many people’s mornings, and the coffee market is a multibillion-dollar industry contributing to many countries’ economies around the world. They can be roasted and ground to then be used for the delicious coffee that some people love to drink every day. Coffee beans experience many physical and chemical changes during the roasting process to transform green coffee beans into the dark brown beans seen in stores and coffee shops. The Fluid-Bed Coffee Roaster design outlined in this report transfers heat to the coffee beans by means of convection to roast small batches of green coffee. The small batch size is crucial in the coffee industry to mitigate the investment costs. A sample sized roaster allows companies to initially taste a certain type of coffee before making the investment to buy large quantities. A small roaster of this size needed both a blower and heating element to suspend and roast the beans to the desired darkness. This roaster highlights design, control implementation and heat transfer which were all instilled at the University of Southern Indiana. The user-friendly design allows anyone to produce fresh, high-quality coffee.