Determination of Physical Properties of Some Agricultural Grains

In this study, for the purpose of determining physical and aerodynamic properties, some varieties of wheat, barley, chickpea and lentil were used. The length, width, thickness, geometric mean diameter, equivalent sphere diameter, sphericity, seed mass, bulk density, true density, projected area, terminal velocity, drag coefficient of each grain variety were determined. The theoretical terminal velocities of those grains were calculated by using equations corrected with the shape factor. For all the grains, theoretical terminal velocities were lower than the experimental values. The average experimental terminal velocity was found to be in the range of 7.52 to 8.14 m/s for wheat varieties, 7.04 to 7.07 m/s for barley varieties, 7.72 to 7.78 m/s for lentil varieties and 11.15 to 12.01 m/s for chickpea varieties. The drag coefficients of seeds according to projected areas in different positions and equivalent spheres were calculated. The drag coefficient in the position of the lowest projected area for all the grain varieties was higher than that in the other position.