| Summary: | Oleic acid needs to be heated when it is utilized for biodiesel production, but, as a low-loss solution, oleic acid is difficult to heat by microwave. An efficient heating method for oleic acid is designed. A high loss material porous media is placed in a quartz tube, and a microwave directly heats the porous medium of the high loss material. The oleic acid flows through the pores of porous media so that the oleic acid exchanges heat during this process and rapid heating of oleic acid is achieved. A coupling model, based on the finite element method, is used to analyze the microwave heating process. The multiphysics model is based on a single mode cavity operating at 2450 MHz. An elaborate experimental system is developed to validate the multiphysics model through temperature measurements carried out for different flow velocities of oleic acid and different microwave power levels. The computational results are in good agreement with the experimental data. Based on the validated model, the effects of different sizes, porosities, and materials on microwave heating efficiency are analyzed.
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