Design, fabrication and testing of a banana fiber extraction machine.

Abstract

Uganda is among the top ten banana-producing countries and for every one tone of banana fruit harvested about 60kg of the plant is rejected (rotten) and approximately two tons of biomass wastes are produced that decomposes emitting a huge amount of methane gases and carbon dioxide, this increases global warming. This adverse effect is highly reduced by using different fiber extraction methods for natural and high quality bast fiber that is fire resistant, makes handicrafts and home decorative. Mechanical extraction is costly with low efficiency thus there was need to develop an optimized, efficient, motorized banana fiber extraction machine locally with adjustable settings to meet the required multi-banana sheath extraction at optimal pulping speed, this can help transfer knowledge for further innovation. This research project designed, fabricated and tested an optimized banana fiber extraction machine to utilize the quality banana fibers locally. The improved and optimized banana fiber extractor was incorporated with adjustable feed rollers and operating at a principle of mechanical adjustment to increase or reduce the roller clearance for efficiency. It was designed with properly round rectangular blades, waste collector, cleaning brushes, optimal operation height and has been fixed to operate at maximum efficient speed of 550 rpm. The performance test showed an efficiency of 88% based on length and with a through put of 19.6 kg of dry fibers a day.