Development of an Animal Feed Rice Grinder

—Its Effectiveness in Grinding Brown Rice and Unhulled Rice—

Abstract

Cattle and pigs cannot easily digest unprocessed rice provided as animal feed; therefore, we have developed a machine that efficiently grinds brown or unhulled rice. The grinder employs the double roll mill method wherein 2 rolls with V-shaped surface grooves that fit together are rotated in directions opposite to each other. As the roll clearance reduced, the extent of grinding increased, while the processing efficiency reduced. For unhulled rice at the higher ripening stage, the grain diameters were reduced. In addition, for unhulled rice, the diameters of large-sized grains were also reduced. For brown rice subjected to a roll clearance of 1.1mm, the processing efficiency was 525kg/h, which was higher than the theoretical value. The total cost of the testing machine was approximately 1/6^th that of the typical high-temperature high-pressure vapor roll crushers employed in medium-scale pig farms.