Proper Design and Evaluation of a Machine for Separating Seed Pea Pods

Abstract

Continuation for unbinding of separating and cleaning seed pea problem and completion spread our investigations in 2008 at 15 Annual Conference of the Miser Society of Agricultural Engineering. The obtained results in this work had been activated and we have done the final design and fabricated in a Workshop in Kafr El-Sheikh Governorate to produce the first specialized machine for separating and cleaning seed pea. Cylinder design with special specifications was used to reduce the exposure of pea seed to impact during the torsion motion. The design used traditional separating theory that helped in seed separation and accelerating the discharge of empty pods and skin from separating chamber to prevent covering and blockage of the concave sieve. After that the mixture of separating fall on oscillating sieve to separate the seed from pods skin. The machine was tested and evaluated under four drum speeds of 8.83, 10.60, 12.36 and 14.13 m/s (375, 450, 525 and 600 r.p.m), three feed rates 6.0, 9.0, 12.0 kg/min, three oscillating shaker speed of 150, 225 and 300 r.p.m (15.7, 23.55 and 31.4 rad/s) and three sieve slope angles of 15, 20, 25 moisture content of 76 % for pods. Machine productivity, separating efficiency, cleaning efficiency, seed losses, seed damage and specific energy had been determined.The results show that, specialized was suitable for separating seed peas with low drum speed 450 r.p.m (10.60 m/s) and 6.0 kg/min feed rate with oscillating shaker 225 r.p.m and sieve slop angle 20. Machine productivity, separating efficiency, cleaning efficiency, seed losses, seed damage and specific energy were 3.40 kg/min, 94.16%, 96.00%, 4.68 %, 1.46% and 11.446 kW.h/ton, respectively.