DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT OF A FRUIT SEED RECOVERY SYSTEM (PITTER, CLEANERS)

A system was designed, manufactured and tested to reliably recover the seeds from fruits such as plums and chokecherries. The design overcame problems inherent in earlier machines (not custom-made), such as limited capacity, batch processing, inability to handle different sizes and shapes of fruit. However, fruit seeds are being recovered with custom-made small-scale systems. These units are generally time and labor intensive. The proposed continuous process system provides relatively large capacity with a smaller, more economical apparatus that has heretofore been available. The system consists of (a) a feeding unit to continuously feed the fruit at a uniform rate, (b) a shearing unit to initially shear the fruit for further processing, (c) a macerating unit to further remove the pulp from the seed and to break up the skin fragments, and (d) a separating unit to achieve the targeted output seed by separating the seed from waste (water, pulp and skin). Each unit was designed, manufactured and tested individually and finally arranged systematically to achieve the final fruit seed recovery system. Operational and design specifications were determined experimentally. Means to reduce adherence of fruits to machine parts during the seed recovery operation were included in the design to minimize maintenance requirements. Preliminary investigations were conducted by constructing small scale experimental units to observe the behavior of material in the mechanical system and optimize the operational specifications. Results of the preliminary investigations were used as guidelines for the final design. The system was extensively tested, both with native plums and chokecherries, and worked successfully. The system can handle 63 kg/h of fruit and is operated by a 3 h.p. electric motor. However, the capacity of the machine can be increased up to 250 kg/h by modifying or redesigning the final seed separating unit