Fabrication and Performance Evaluation of a Portable Motorized Pineapple Juice Extractor

Abstract

A motorized Juice extractor was designed, fabricated and its Performance Evaluation was carried out to determine the best extracting operating factors for the prototype. The two operating factors used for evaluating this machine are extraction speed (S) at three levels (i.e. S₁=565 rpm, S₂=478 rpm and S₃=380 rpm) and Feed rate (F) at three levels (i.e. F₁=0.5kg/min, F₂=1.0kg/min and F₃=1.5kg/min). Each of these factors was replicated thrice, which resulted into 3X3X3 factorial experimental design. In addition, the performance parameters used for evaluating this prototype are the Extraction efficiency 14 ?f"> (%), Extraction losses 14?l"> (%) and Extraction capacity 14C?x"> (lit/hr). The performance evaluation results obtained from this experimental design shows an optimum Juice Extraction Efficiency, 14?f"> =87.50%, Juice Extraction Capacity 14C?x"> =26.70lit/hr with Juice Extraction Losses, 14?l"> =12.50% at S₃F₂ operating factors (i.e. S₃=380 rpm and F₂=1.0kg/min). The optimum output of this prototype was compared with that of manual extraction method which was evaluated to have manual Juice Extraction Efficiency, 14?fm"> =97.00%, manual Juice Extraction Capacity 14 C?xm"> =5.25lit/hr and manual Juice Extraction Losses 14 ?lm"> =3.08%. Hence, this prototype was rated to be five times faster than human method of extracting juice from fruits. Although, the extraction losses of this prototype was observed to be slightly higher than that of manual extraction method. This suggests there is need to further improve on this prototype for higher extraction efficiency, 14?f"> (%) close to that of human beings.

Keywords: Feed rate, Extraction losses, Extraction Efficiency, manual extraction efficiency, performance parameters, Operating factors, proto-type and fruit pulp.