In this work, control strategies for grain aeration based on timer, thermostat and thermostat combined with humidistats were compared to the AERO controller. In spite of the simplicity of the first three strategies, they are widely used, resulting in reliable control and high acceptance by farmers. AERO was developed at the Federal University of Viçosa to spread and facilitate the use of more sophisticated strategies by farmers. This controller is based on real time data acquisition and process simulation. The results showed that aeration time, as well as final grain deterioration rates, temperatures and moisture contents were similar among the four strategies, when considering the best set-points of the three simple controllers. However, AERO resulted in a more effective control, cooling the grain mass more quickly and reducing temperature and moisture content oscillations during the aeration process. Another advantage of AERO is its capacity of automatically adjust its set-points according to the weather conditions of the region where the aeration system is operating.
Stored grain; control strategy; aeration; simulation
