Development of a Ceramic Cassava Peeling-and-Washing Machine

Olayanju, T.M.A. and Isaac, Moses O. and Okonkwo, Clinton E. and Alake, S. A. and Friday, Muyiwa G. (2019) Development of a Ceramic Cassava Peeling-and-Washing Machine. Mindanao Journal of Science and Technology, 17. pp. 84-97.

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Abstract

Manual peeling of cassava is still practiced by the cassava processors due to high mechanical damage of existing cassava peelers. The aim of this study was to develop a cassava peeling-and-washing machine using ceramic mixture as the abrasive surface. The developed machine performs two operations concurrently – peeling and washing. The peeling surface was cast with ceramic mixture, which composed of ceramic, sand and cement (1:3:1). The machine was driven by a 10-hp, 3-phase motor operating at 900 rpm with a pulley ratio of 1:5 and belt. The effect of varying weight capacity of cassava tubers per batch on the performance efficiency of the machine was also studied. It was observed that as the weight of cassava tubers fed into the machine (3.5 to 15.5 kg) increased, the peeling efficiency, quality of performance, and throughput capacity increased, whereas mechanical damage and peel retention decreased. On the contrary, as the weight of tubers in the machine decreased, the peeling efficiency, quality of performance, and throughput capacity decreased while mechanical damage and peel retention increased. Understanding the effect of cassava tubers fed per batch by processors was deemed useful for high performance efficiency during usage of the developed machine.

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