Design and Development of Integrated Slurry Food Processing Machine

Abstract

An integrated slurry food processing machine comprising an I. C. engine, water dispensing, milling and sieving units was designed and developed. The machine grinds soaked grains and separates the slurry food (starch) content of the ground grain paste from its fibrous chaff in a single flow process thereby reducing drudgery in the discharging and feeding of the paste between the milling and sieving processes. It also eliminated human contact with the ground grain paste during sieving as contained in the existing semi-mechanized and traditional slurry food processing methods. Performance analysis revealed 64.25%, 66.01% and 70.16% as the respective average extraction rate of this machine when millet, maize and soybean were processed using 2.90kg of water while 53.62kg/hr, 56.21kg/hr and 47.76kg/hr constitutes its throughputs with the respective grains. However, in the manual process, an individual processes an average of 12.62kg ground maize paste per hour using an average water of 5.62kg with extraction rate of 57.01%. In addition, unlike the manual and other mechanized slurry food sieving systems, this machine extracts the slurry food from its ground paste by compression using a horizontal screw press sieving unit, hence, its extraction rate is independent of the texture/fineness of the ground grain paste. Thus, this innovation is energy, water and time saving and also improves hygiene in the slurry food production.

Key Words: Cereals, drudgery reduction, integrated machine, milling, slurry food, sieving