A virtual prototyping approach for redesigning the vent-holes of packaging for handling pomegranate fruit – A short communication

In a previous study, experimental analysis and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modelling were used to analyse the cooling performances of two corrugated fibreboard package designs (CT1 and CT2) for handling pomegranate fruit. In these analyses, the performance of the CT1 carton was shown to be low compared to the CT2 carton in terms of cooling rate, cooling uniformity and energy usage. The low performance of the CT1 carton was attributed to its improperly designed vent-holes. In the present communication, a virtual prototype approach, based on computational fluid dynamics (CFD), was used to redesign the CT1 carton for improved performance. This method enabled us to examine the thermal performance of new vent-hole configuration which was validated experimentally using the physical prototype of the new carton design. The new ventilation enabled 14.4% faster cooling and lowered pressure drop by 35.3 Pa m-1 (6.5%) in fruit loaded cartons.