Design and fabrication of palmyra seed splitting machine

Abstract

This research is concerned with the design and fabrication of a prototype Palmyra seed splitting machine to minimize the time and labor requirements in the extraction of Palmyra fruit apples. The prototype splitter consists of the main frame, holding units, cutting units, a splitting unit, a power transmission unit and a 0.5hp electric motor as the prime mover. In the operation, a Palmyra seed is first manually placed in the holding unit and securely tightened. The holding unit is next mechanically motioned along the circular guiding groove toward the cutting unit to cut open the outer shell of the Palmyra seed. The fruit is then removed from the holding unit for the subsequent extraction of the Palmyra fruit apple with the splitting unit. According to the experimental results, the optimal performance was achieved with the deployment of 4-inch, 40-tooth circular saw blades for the cutting unit, operating at 1,450 rounds/minute (rpm). The production capacity was 46±0.6 seeds/hour and the energy consumption was 0.99 kW-hour. In addition, the optimal speed of 1,450 rpm produced zero damaged Palmyra fruit apple. Furthermore, an engineering economic analysis showed that, at an annual usage rate of 1,440 hours, the machine cost was on average THB 0.95/seed, the payback period was 2 months and the breakeven point was 205 hours/ year.