A COMPARATIVE EVALUATION OF HAMMER MILL AND GRATER FOR GARI PRODUCTION

Abstract

An investigation was carried out to determine the comparative performance of hammer mill and grater in gari production. The grater and hammer mill were used to pulverized cassava tubers and the dewatered mash of the samples. The throughput of 1002.7 and 1440 kg/h comminution and pulverization respectively) than the grater (with a throughput of 356.7 and 42.9kg/h respectively). The sieve analysis of the pulverized mash and gari shows that hammer mill communites finer than the grater. There is a difference in the swelling capacities of gari from both machines with that of the grater being greater than that of the hammer mill. The resulting gari products from both machines however meet the ASAE standards in terms of quality. With regards to energy use the hammer consumes more energy than the grater. In general, the higher output of the hammer mill and the corresponding fitness of the products into the required range of standard accords it a higher potential in substituting other size reduction machines in large scale gari production.