Parametric study on trash separation efficiency in fresh fruit bunches (ffb) consignment

Trash or contamination in oil palm fresh fruit bunches (FFB) is one of the major problems encountered by palm oil millers. Trash is commonly referred to as non-oil palm fruit matters, such as stones, sand, soil, mud, wood, grass, leaves and twigs, which are constituted in FFB consignments delivered to the mills. Trash is undesirable as it often causes choking, severe process machinery wear and tear and reduction in oil extraction rate (OER) due to the inclusion of trash weight. In this study, a vibrating trash separating machine prototype was developed locally to separate undesirable trash from FFB consignments. This study aimed to evaluate the performance of this prototype machine based on the total amount of trash removed from the FFB and loose fruits consignments. Three gap size configurations were studied, namely 45, 30 and 15 mm. The results showed that the prototype machine successfully removed trash from wet and dry FFB consignments with separation efficiencies of 80.95% and 91.91%, respectively. The best gap size between the rod bars was indicated by 15 mm. This prototype machine is expected to solve the contamination issue during palm oil milling process due to lack of efficient system to remove trash from the FFB consignments.