DEVELOPMENT OF A MACHINE FOR COATING PEANUT WITH WHEAT FLOUR AND EGG SUSPENSION

Abstract

Coated peanuts exit in the supermarkets in many parts of the world. However, machines for coating peanuts with additives does not exist in Nigeria. Therefore, a machine for coating peanut with wheat flour and egg suspension was designed and fabricated for market oriented production. The procedures employed include the design, construction, testing and performance evaluation. The machine components are: the rotating drum, frame, shaft, pipes, pipe holder, machine cover, the speed reduction gear, the electric motor and the driving and driven pulleys. The shaft rotates the drum by the transmission system through the belt and the pulley system in order to carry out coating operation. The machine runs on a single phase 0.754 kW, 1420 rpm electric motor cum reduction gear system at a speed of 30 rpm. The estimated cost of fabrication of the machine was ₦52,335.00. The rotating drum is mounted on the shaft, supported by two bearings with the shaft rotating in a stationary position. The rotating shaft is arranged horizontally on the pulleys with the belt, to be powered by the reduction gear cum electric motor. The performance of the coating machine was tested with 2 weight samples of egg suspension (0.16 kg & 1.52 kg) and wheat flour (0.82 kg & 1.97 kg ); 3 levels of coating speeds (10, 20 and 30 rpm); 5 levels of coating time (5, 10, 15, 20 and 25 min) arranged in a randomized complete design (RCD) of a 2 × 2 × 3 × 5 factorial experiment with three replicates in each treatment and comparison between treatments mean were done by least significant difference (LSD) at the P ˂ 0.05. The results showed that, the highest effective coating capacity was 2.47 kg/min with coating speeds of 10 rpm. It is therefore, observed that an effective coating capacity decreases with an increase in time of coating and increase in coating speed. The optimum coating efficiency was found to be 89.84% of operating time and speed of 20 min and of 30 rpm respectively. The capacity of the coating drum is 0.0294 m2. The coating machine is recommended for small and medium producers in order to enhance their production output