Development of a Moringa Oleifera Seed Shelling Machine

The rising awareness of the importance of moringa seeds has geared interest in its mass production. A major step in making the seed available for it vast usage is shelling. Most rural farmers of moringa seed use the traditional methods of shelling. These methods are tedious, time consuming with attendance low outputs that produce unhygienic products. The need to develop appropriate machines and equipment for processing of moringa seeds become necessary. This work developed a moringa seed shelling machine using available local materials. The development of the shelling machine was based on engineering mechanics of impact and shearing forces. The machine consists of a hopper, shelling unit, shafts, cleaning unit, sieve, discharge unit, power transmission unit and frame. The machine was evaluated based on variation in speed and feedrate to obtain the shelling efficiency, throughput capacity and percentage seed damage at 14% (d.b) moisture content powered by a 0.75 kW electric motor. The results obtained show that the machine has the highest shelling efficiency of 72.72% at 60 g/min feedrate with a throughput capacity of 8.31 kg/hr and the minimum percentage seed breakage of 2.22%. Machine speed of 250 rpm favoured the smooth operation and performance of the machine. The machine is very useful for rural people, farmers and small scale industries for post-harvest processing of moringa seeds since it cost and operational principle is within their technical know-how and capability.