Design, development and performance evaluation of a portable cocoa seed extractor

Abstract

Even though cash crops like cocoa, cotton and rubber are a major source of revenue for the nation, the unavailability of affordable and easily accessible post-harvest process machines has made it impossible to generate maximum income from these crops. A cocoa seed extractor was produced to increase the productivity of cocoa farmers and reduce the stress and dangers they are exposed to in the process of splitting the cocoa pods and separating the cocoa beans from the pods. The machine has two major chambers: A cocoa seed extractor was produced to increase the productivity of cocoa farmers and reduce the stress and dangers they are exposed to in the process of splitting the cocoa pods and separating the cocoa beans from the cocoa pods, fed into it by the conveyor belt, to crack the pods as they are forced through the centre of rotation. The sprout then conveys the cracked pod to the separating chamber where a rotating beater beats the pod, forcing the cocoa seeds out of it. The seeds then pass through the 16mm sieve in the chamber and are collected at the cocoa seed outlet while the pod is collected at the pods outlet. The machine is powered by a 3 horse power and a 0.74 horse power electric motor. The materials used in its fabrication are locally sourced. A performance evaluation of the machine reveals that it works at an efficiency of 87.5% in terms of the number of cocoa pods processed per day, and at 75% efficiency in terms of the number of cocoa seeds processed without damage. The throughput of the machine is 250kg/hr. Thus, the cocoa seed extractor can process 8,228pods/day compared to about 400pods/day that can be processed by an average person.