Design, Fabrication and Testing of a Wet Legume Dehulling Machine

Egbe E.A.P.^1, and Roland B.O.¹

¹Department of Mechanical Engineering, School of Engineering and Engineering Technology, Federal University of Technology, Minna, Nigeria

Cite this paper:
Egbe E.A.P. and Roland B.O.. Design, Fabrication and Testing of a Wet Legume Dehulling Machine. American Journal of Mechanical Engineering. 2016; 4(3):108-111. doi: 10.12691/ajme-4-3-4

Abstract

The traditional method of dehulling legumes such as cowpea, soya beans and locust beans is by rubbing the seeds between the palms or by pounding in mortar but this process consumes time and energy. A motorized wet type legume dehuller was designed and fabricated to de-hull soaked seeds. It was designed to work on the principle of compression for the splitting of the soaked seed coat. The de-hulling is achieved by shear and friction between the beans coat and the wall of the de-hulling chamber. The device was designed and fabricated using locally available materials and technology. The motorized legume de-huller operates at effective de-hulling speed of 438 rpm and achieved a maximum efficiency of 95.2% for 6 minutes soaking period for cowpea, 72.2% efficiency for soya beans soaked in hot water for 30 minutes and 62.5% efficiency for 15 hours cooking period for locust beans, The de-huller was designed for feed rate of 500 seeds per second.

Keywords:
legume dehulling abrasive strength soaking period

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References:

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