| A motorized walnut cracking machine was designed and developed to overcome the drudgery and huge time involved in traditional walnut cracking and the prototype was evaluated under three different levels of shell moisture content (db) (25-30%, 15-20% and 8-12%) and three different levels of roller speeds (25 rpm, 43 rpm and 69 rpm) of the cracking unit. The main components of machine involves motor, frame, hopper, conveying tray, cracking unit, conveying chute and collecting bin. The working principle of cracking unit is based on the compression of the walnut between two rollers rotating in opposite direction. Sphericity coefficient for soft shelled, medium shelled and hard shelled walnut were 0.850, 0.845 and 0.857, respectively. The geometric mean... |
