Development of an Indigenous Rice Thresher in Nigeria

Abstract

Rice threshing in Nigeria remains a problem to the average peasant farmer. The techniques for threshing rice are still the traditional method of hand beating. This method is laborious, time wasting and not economical. Also the commonly available rice threshers are the imported ones which are not affordable to majority of the farmers. In an attempt to address this problem, a rice thresher/cleaner was designed, fabricated and evaluated. Physical properties of Faro 51 rice such as length of ears, length and breadth of grain, grain/straw ratio and moisture content were studied. The thresher was evaluated in terms of threshing efficiency, cleaning efficiency and percentage grain loss. At an average moisture content of 13.83% (wet basis), and design cylinder speed of 556rpm, test results reveal that the thresher has a threshing and cleaning efficiencies of 98.01 and 99.32% respectively and total percent losses of4.78%. The thresher has an output capacity of 267.9 kgh-l.