OILSEEDS PREPARATION
Andreotti Impianti technologies cover all the necessary equipment for the preparation of the main oilseeds as soybeans, sunflowerseed and rapeseed and others. The preparation plant is a very crucial sequence of activities from which depends the performance guarantees of any following process plant. The main target of preparation is in fact to prepare, modify and bring the harvested seed in the most suitable specification for having the most effective extraction by solvent extraction or by mechanical pressing.
According to the type of seed processed, the preparation plant foresees a dedicated succession of several processes:
- Weighing - stabilizing the flow at the plant inlet
- Cleaning-removing of coarse particles
- Destoning-removing stones and impurities
- Conditioning-reducing the viscosity and adjust the moisture content
- Cracking-reducing the size of the cleaned oilseeds
- Dehulling-removing hulls for modifying the final meal protein content
- Flaking-improving extraction performances for a better percolation into solvent extraction plant
- Pressing-improving extraction performances for some specific type of seeds, as Sunflowerseed and Rapeseed.
- Expanding - improving the extraction step in terms of plant capacity and percolation
- Milling - homogenizing the size of meal and hulls
- Pelletting - improving the stocking and the logistic of the finished product
PREPARATION PLANTS FOR SOYBEANS
Many different ways of processing soybean seed are possible. The choice on the most suitable process depends on two main aspects:
Starting moisture grade of Soybean seeds
Final targeted meal protein content Independently we're talking about Front End dehulling, Warm Dehulling , Hot Dehulling or processes without dehulling ,the seed could be fed to the plant with a moisture grade up to 14% and we could get a final meal that fully match the HP meal specification.
PREPARATION PLANTS FOR SUNFLOWERSEED
One of the most important phase in Sunflowerseed processing is the dehulling one that has a direct impact on final meal protein content. Higher is the amount of Hulls removed, higher will be protein % in the extracted meal. Andreotti could provide several ways to remove the hulls from sunflowerseed:
- One stage dehulling for less than 16% hull residual content in dehulled seed
- Double stage dehulling for less than 11% hull residual content in dehulled seed. After the dehulling a hull control section is required for ensuring that oil losses during hull separation is as low as possible.
PREPARATION PLANTS FOR RAPESEED
The rapeseed has an higher oil content than soybean seed and need to be physically modified in terms of shape and particle size before being sent to extraction plant.
The rapeseed in fact, after being cleaned, is broken and conditioned in dedicated equipment before flaking where the thickness of the flakes is a key factor for an efficient oil extraction phase.
Very commonly the flakes of rapeseed are transformed in to expelled cake thanks to screw presses action, where the oil content in the cake is reduced to below 20% ( in case of pre-pressing).
As an alternative the rapeseed oil could be extracted both in a cold pressing way and in a full pressing mode, in accordance with specific requirement of final oil specifications.
GRINDING AND PELLETTING
Why is important to grind and/or pelletize meals and hulls?
The extracted meals could be used in feed production as important protein addictive in combination whit other feed ingredients.
The separated hulls could be sold in the market as they are or even most commonly are used as an alternative energy source especially fro steam generation in boiler rooms.
Thanks to grinding and/or pelletizing plants, Andreotti technologies could transform by product in valuable ones, driving the client to be paid back with a premium price or having significant operational and logistical costs savings.
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