Design of Lotus Seed Separating Machine from its pod

Abstract

Lotus SeedSeparating Machine from its pod was contained from angle steel frame and including three main mechanisms:conveyor unit, blading unit and seperating unit.The conveyor unit was consists of attachment chain that U-shaped steel attached to the top for pedunclelotus. After feeding to blading unit, the blade was cutted out the bottom of pods and pedunclelotus. The pods with lotus seed was drop through separating unit. The two brush units of separating unit were rotated in a downward direction, separating the lotus seeds from the pods.  Test of the Lotus SeedSeparating Machine atthe speeds of the conveyor unit were 24, 28 and 36 rpm in conjunction with three separating units speed of 822, 960 and1152 rpm, respectively. The speed of the blading unit was fixed at 720 rpm.The optimum rotational speed of the conveyor unit of 36 rpm and the separating unit speed of 1152 rpm resulted in the highest working capacity at 34.3 kg h^-1.The percentage of separated seeds was 47.5 % and separating capacity was 6.4 kg h^-1. Economical analysis showed that the machine worked 640 h year^-1, the average costs was found to be 27,533.5 Baht year^-1, seeds separating cost6.72 Bahtkg^-1 of lotus seed seeds, separating wage17 Bahtkg^-1 of lotus seed, payback period 4 monthand the break even point of the machine that considering the seperated lotus seed weight to be 0.1 ton year^-1.