In South Western Nigeria, after the harvesting of maize cobs from the field, large amount of maize stock remains as agricultural residues and wastes. The maize stock constitutes a menace to the environment if not property handled. In this study, densification equipment was designed, fabricated and tested using maize stock grind as raw material. The equipment consists of mixer/ moisture conditioner and a pelleting machine. The power rating for the mixer/moisture conditioner is 0.069 kW with an input capacity of 81 kg/h while the power consumption of the pellet machine is 0.8 kW with throughout capacity of 40 kg/h. The result of the test showed that the highest product temperature, which gives an indication of the quality and durability of the pellets produced was 930C at 0.8 mm hammer mill screen size, 10% moisture content and 150 rpm die speed, at this temperature the machine is operating at optimum efficiency of 74%. High product temperature is an important parameter during pelleting/briquetting operations because it gives the degree of compaction and binding of the pellets/briquettes. The densification equipment for organic biomass was developed using locally sourced materials as a means of converting agricultural wastes into pellets for domestic cooking and cottage industry uses.

The aim of this study was to design, construct and evaluate the performance of solar aided crib for storage of freshly harvested maize (Zea mays) in a humid tropical climate. A crib with two drying chambers of size 600 mm x 685 mm x 1500 mm with moisture emission chamber of 600 mm x 115 mm x 1500 mm was designed, constructed and evaluated using appropriate design procedures at the department of Agricultural and Environmental Engineering, Federal University of Technology, Akure, Ondo State, Nigeria. The roof of the crib is made of perspex which transmits the sun's energy into stored maize in the crib for effective drying purpose. The crib was raised at 50 mm above the ground surface and wire netted against rodents. It has two doors for easy loading and off-loading. Freshly harvested Maize weighing 500 kg of 30.5% moisture content (wet basis) was stored for three months. Moisture content of the maize was taken on weekly basis while relative humidity and temperature were measured on daily basis. Readings were taken at three positions (top, middle and bottom) in apertures that were made in those positions but were immediately covered up at the end of every reading.  The ambient temperatures varied from 20.90C to 380C and also relative humidity varied from 41% to 91% throughout the period of the experiment. The moisture content at the point of storage was 30.5 % but was reduced to 4 % after three months. The final weight of maize in cobs was 362 kg which implied that the Perspex roof significantly aided in the drying process. The structure is structurally balanced and there was no grain deterioration either by fungal invasion or insects attack during the storage period. Keywords: Crib, Drying, Moisture content, Storage, Temperature

Small scale backyard poultry buildings, which could be of any shape and design, are very important and every household in Nigeria should embrace. However, it is difficult for most households to plan and design appropriate buildings for their poultry birds. This study was carried out to design a building which could allow birds to exhibit their natural behaviours without being exposed to hazards and predators. The building with dimensions 2.8 m long, 2.3 m wide and 1.9 m height at the front and 1.3 m at the back was developed using local materials. The building comprised of resting room and a free space for poultry to exhibit their natural behaviours such as dust bathing, wing flapping and preening. There were perches inside the building were birds could roost at night. The indoor and outdoor climatic conditions (air temperature and air relative humidity) were evaluated. The result of the study showed that the highest mean indoor air temperature (30.60 °C) and highest mean indoor air relative humidity (83.88 %) were obtained in the afternoon and night respectively. The lowest mean indoor air temperature (24.23 °C) and mean indoor air relative humidity (66.64 %) were obtained in the night and afternoon respectively. The building was considered affordable ($280.00) and suitable for poultry grown for egg and meat production in the tropical humid climate.

Introduction: Chickens in extensive and semi-intensive poultry production systems account for more than 75% of all poultry in the Southern Nigeria. Aims: To design, construct and test a thermal control solar heated poultry house. Methodology: Thermally controlled solar heated poultry house was designed and constructed in the Department of Agricultural and Environmental Engineering Research Farm, Federal University of Technology, Akure, Nigeria. The poultry house consists of seven sections/rooms of which five rooms were regulated into five different temperature levels while one of the last two serve as control experiment section and the other serve as the observation section. The poultry house was tested and evaluated using developed and calibrated data logger to determine the environmental condition in the thermally controlled animal house with respect to the ambient conditions. The results obtained from the pre-stock test were analyzed graphically using Microsoft excel software version 2016 Results: The dry bulb temperature in the poultry house is 28.91±0.02ºC, 31.75±0.14ºC, 34.93 ±0.06ºC, 37.92±0.07ºC, 40.95±0.06ºC and 26.47±1.72ºC for sections with preconditioned temperature of 29ºC, 32ºC, 35ºC, 38ºC 41ºC and control respectively, dry bulb temperature in the poultry house is 20.39±0.32ºC, 21.64±0.1ºC, 19.13±0.2ºC, 17.57±0.27ºC, 16.26±0.27ºC and 24.77 ±0.1ºC for sections with preconditioned temperature of 29ºC, 32ºC, 35ºC, 38ºC 41ºC and control respectively, the relative humidity in the poultry house is 44.69±2.37%, 41.9±1.21%, 38.43±0.38%, 33.8. Conclusion: There was little or no temperature stability in the non-thermally controlled section of the poultry house, the temperature of the thermally controlled section of the poultry house was found in a close range with low deviation from the preset temperature in the sections.

Poultry industry’s development in the past two decades and the need for increased animal protein sources in the hot regions of the world, require the need to develop housing system that is thermally controlled for optimal production. The research was carried out at Federal University of Technology Akure, Ondo State, Nigeria. The facility consisted of a broiler house of 6 rooms enclosed by masonry sidewalls at the base and insulated plywood at the upper section of the house with each experimental room equipped with blower, suction fan and heater. The data were monitored at the most critical time of the day – 1 pm during the dry season. Experimental data were recorded using developed and calibrated data logger. The 5 experimental rooms are programed to 5 temperature levels (41, 38, 35, 32 and 29°C) characterizing extreme heat boundary conditions for broilers with fans programmed at 1.5 m/s air velocity. The aim of this study is to evaluate the thermal distribution in solid-wall broiler houses using computational fluid dynamics (CFD). The CFD technique allows visualizing air flow according to different running condition for each room for exhaust fans, as well as other parameters. The simulation was used to determine the air temperature variation, inner wall temperature, external temperature, air velocity distribution, external wall heat flux, pressure and wall heat transfer coefficient in all the experimental rooms of poultry house. The simulated air flow pattern and temperature distribution in the experimental rooms were analyzed and the result revealed increase room temperature as the preset room temperature increases. However, the velocity profile in all the room shows buildup of air at the outlet vent due to turbulence created by the suction fans. The pressure profile across the rooms was relatively the same.

This research was aimed at designing and developing a discomfort index meter for evaluating transportation stress on broilers. The newly developed discomfort index meter is capable of recording and logging data every 5 seconds. The device was designed using LM35 electronic sensor to measure the dry bulb and wet bulb temperatures in degree Celsius (oC) and then use it to compute the discomfort level using the Thom model with the help of microcontroller. The newly developed equipment was successfully used to evaluate the effect of transport on the level of stress of four weeks old broilers over various distances and stocking densities using different means of transportation. The equipment was calibrated and compared with other available measuring instruments which showed that a high correlation exist between the values (r2 = 0.89).Also, a single factor (one-way) analysis of variance (ANOVA) was carried out and the results showed no significant difference between the two sets of values at 0.05 level of confidence which implies that the two readings are identical. The relative humidity readings of the device were compared with that of standard digital hygrometer reading using a regression analysis which also showed a high correlation coefficient (r2=0.98). A straight line regression equation y = 0.9497x + 5.1542 describes the relationship. The equipment is affordable and therefore recommended for determining stress on broilers and other livestock animals in transithttp://dx.doi.org/10.4314/njt.v36i3.40

A laboratory scale kerosene fueled incubator made of locally available materials was evaluated and modified in order to improve its performance. It has capacity for 30 egg. The defects identified with the incubator during the initial tests were rectified and the incubator was modified. The original design operated within a temperature and relative humidity range of 36.8 – 38.8o C and 56.5 – 66.5% respectively and had an average percentage hatchability of 75% for domestic fowl eggs. The modified incubator had an average percentage hatchability of 88.4% had operates within a temperature and relative humidity range of 37.0o – 38.0oC and 58.0 – 70.0% respectively. The percentage hatchability of the original design compares favourably with the various types of commercial incubators found in literature while the modified incubator performed better. The incubator id recommended for small scale chick production in the tropical region and could be enlarged for medium/large scale chick production.

Compression test was conducted on packaged common tomatoes in Nigeria (Roma VF) to study the effects of size and load configuration in terms of the fruits axes, deformation and stress at break and yield point of the fruits due to static loading. Different sizes of tomato were selected and ranged as big, medium sized, and small sized tomato. The bigger sizes were grouped as the A class, while the medium sizes were grouped as B class, and the smaller sized as C class. The samples were further classified as A1, A2, B1, B2, C1 and C2. While all samples having the suffix 1 were subjected to axial loading, the ones with 2 were subjected to radial loading under the Instron Universal Compression Testing Machine at the stress rate of 0.002 MPa. The study shows that majority of the samples tends to withstand higher force axially than radially for bigger and medium sized. But for the smaller tomato ranging from 35mm and below, the material was able to withstand high pressure force radially than axially before yielding.