Sugar Processing Technology

Cane Preparation

Y ared Tesfaye
Food Process Engineering DEPARTMENT
 Out lines----lecture 2

 Cutter
 Shredder
 Crusher
 Chapter 3
Cane preparation
Prior to milling the cane is cleaned
Cane preparation: A size reduction operation
Purpose: to creat optimun condition for maximum juice extraction
Disintegration or size reduction of cane stalk is done by;
 Cutters
 Shredders
 Crushers
 Cutters
 Are revolving knives that cut the stalks in to chips
 This equipment gives such an improvement in feeding
that to day it is no longer a question of doing without them
Why they are indispensable?
i. Attempts of obtaining a completely even feed to the mill with a
whole cane is never really successful
ii. Even canes prepared by equalizers, reach the mill only in
successive lumps , and its small bulk density will render difficult
the work of the crusher
i.e. : Difficult in “swallowing “ as much cane as possible in a given time →↓ Mill
capacity
iii.The metal of the mill rollers often slips on the smooth, waxy and
polished skin of the cane
Consequence: Chokes occur, with short or long
interruption to the feed or ↓ crushing rate
 The cane knives then perform two functions and
have two advantages:
• They favor the capacity of the mills
• They assist the extraction of the mills by
breaking the rind of the cane and so facilitating its
disintegration and the extraction of its juice
• NB: The transverse dividing walls (nodes) of sugar cane
which is resistance to mill pressure have been filled with
a sugar–bearing pulp which can be more rapidly
recovered as the cylinder are opened and the dividing
walls broken.

nodes
Fig 3. Knife set with twin reversible blades & Reversible blade.
 Shredder
Are hammer –mills
Shredders That Shred The Cane But Extract No Juice
Objective: To complete the preparation and
disintegration of the cane so as to facilitate the
extraction of juice by mills
Having this equipment in the prepartion unit can
reduce the numeber of mills for extraction
Thus :
Fincha sugar Two knives + Four mills

wonji sugar Two knives + Five mills

 Why hammer mills (shredders)?
• The tissue of cane cell is very resistant
• If these cells can be torn open and disintegrated, the juice
is liberated, becoming more accessible and easily extracted.
• To obtain such an effect it is necessary to rupture the
tissues;
How? Forcing the pieces of cane to pass through a very
narrow space, thus blocking them on one side and striking
them on the other side with a powerful blow

The hammer mill has been chosen with this objective

C. Crushers
 The crusher is the first machine applying pressure which the cane encounters on
arriving at the milling plant.
 It consists of a mill, generally of two rollers, which perform two main functions:

a. It assures the feeding of the whole tandem

b. It prepares the cane in such a way as to facilitate:

• The grip of the rollers and

• The extraction of juice by the mills

 The characteristics of the crushers therefore are the following:

1. It possesses a surface especially designed & constructed :
• To grip the cane or pieces of cane which are fed to it effectively
• To break ,tear up, and crush the cane
Reason: To permit the mills to get to work immediately and effectively on the broken
up material
2. It should have a peripheral speed superior to that of the mills which it has to
feed

Reason:

• Since the material which is fed to it has not yet assumed the form of
bagasse, and is still difficult to grip

• If it had the same speed as the mills, it can’t supply the mill the quantity of
material which they are capable of treating
 The crusher is a device for feeding and preparation and not for extraction
 However, it is advantageous for the total extraction of the tandem, if it
extract as much as possible

Reason:
• The cane with less juice entering the first mill , the less will remain in
the bagasse leaving the mill.
• The mill do recover a very large proportion of the juice which the
crusher leaves, but never all of it
Milling(Extaction)
 Feeding of the mills & Conveying of Bagasse
 The prepared cane which enters the first mill, as well as the material
travels from mill to mill to the end of the tandem (Bagasse), moves
under the effect of different forces viz.

1. Gravity

2. Gravity, restrained by sliding

3. A thrust device, provided by an endless belt, a pusher or other mechanical

device

 These three methods act on the material all the way from its entry to
the mills till it leaves the tandem.
 For the Extraction of the crushed cane
• Multiple set of three roller mills are most commonly used.
 Some mills consists of four, five or six rollers in multiple sets
 In most case conveyers transport the crushed cane from one mill
to the next
Imbibition: Process of absorption, by soaking up a liquid
 During conveying crushed cane from one mill to the next:
• Water juice from other processing areas is introduced in to the
last mill and transferred from mill to mill towards the first two
mills, While the crushed cane travels from the first to the last
mills this process is called imbibition.
Juice Extraction cont......
 Juice is extracted by the following Two Methods
1. Straight Mill Tandem:
Extracting Force(pressure) + Mass Transfer (Leaching)
2. Mill – Diffuser Arragment :
Extracting Force (Pressure) + Mass Transfer (Diffusion
+ Leaching)
Cont......
 Wonji
Straight Mill Tandem 2 Knives+5Mill Set
 Metehara
Mill-Diffuser Arragment 2 Knives+3 Millset +1diffuser

 Fincha
Straight Mill Tandem 2 Knives+4Mill Set
 Straight mill tandem
Generally 4 to 5 mill sets are required (optimum)
A mill set contains three corrugated rollers
Top

Fed Dis
 EXTRACTION (MILLING)
bagasse

Cane Pre- Mill Mill Mill

paration No 1 No. 2 No. N

First extraction juice Juice water

Mixed juice
Mixed juice Counter-current
Brix 13 to15 Extraction
Purity 80 to 90 ( 4 to 5 Mills)
Mixed juice to
23
clarification
Mill – Diffuser Arragment
D iffusion..../.
 Imbibition water

Prepared
Mill house Bagasse
cane

Mixed juice

General Material Balance on Milling U.O

Mixed juice = cane - bagasse + imbibition water

24
• Sugar factories are self sufficient in energy,using
bagasse as fuel during the crop season.
25
 Several Important Aspects To Extraction

 The extraction is actually conducted as a counter-

current process using fresh hot water at one end being
pumped in the opposite direction to the cane.

 The more water that is used, the more sugar is

extracted but the more dilute the mixed juice is and
hence the more energy that is required to evaporate the
juice.
 The more accurately that the mills are set
[adjusted], the drier is the residual fiber and hence
the less sugar remaining in the fiber

 Optimization is required on imbibition water vs

evaportor load
 Efficiency
Extraction Efficiency

Preparation Efficiency
Juice Extraction efficiency of the mill plant

For straight mill tandem ȵ ex ≥96%

For cane diffusion system ȵ ex = 97- 98%

 Extent of disintegration
• The state of disintegration of cane is
expressed by the percentage of Pol in the
open cells ,or index of preparation (I.P) as
calculated by :

With out shredder i.e. after knives I.P=65-75%

With heavy duty shredder I.P = 82- 92%

 Factors affecting efficiency of
mills
The main factors affecting mill efficiency are:
 Degree of cane preparation

 Mill set clearance (pressure)

 Number of mills in the tandem

 Imbibition Water Percentage

 Design of Rollers
 Mill Roller Grooves
• The mill must always be capable of accepting,crushing
and delivering.

• Mill rollers should not be polished if not roller slips

on the feed material and extreme loads on the pressure
feeder

• To alleviate the above problem and to break up the

bagasse more completley and facilitate the extraction
of the juice by the following mills , Grooving of the
rollers is vital.
.
 Types of Grooves

1) Circumfferential Grooves

2) Chevron Grooves

3) Messchaerate Grooves( Juice Grooves)

 Different Grooves
1. Circumfferential Grooves
 This V- grooving is designed to give better feeding ability to the rollers
and to achieve satisfactory removal of all juice generated.
 The improvement on feeding ability is obtained by the wedging action
of the bagasse as it is compressed in the roller groves
 It is formed by the roller with notches describing complete circles in
planes perpendicular to its axis and distributed regularly over the length
of the rollers
 Variation of Grooving Along the Tandem
The size of grooves generally decreased from the first
to the last mill due to the following resons :
a)The bagasse become finer and finer as it proceds
from the first to the last milll
b)Since the objective of grooving is to break up the
bagasse and to facilitate the extraction of the juice, the
coarser grooves at the first mills should distegrate it
effectvely(Proper Functioning Of Machnery)
2. Chevron grooves
 The object of this groove is improving the feed of the
bagsse in the grinding operation by the effect of griping
 It is formed by grooving the rollers with notches cut in the
teeth, in sequence which discribes ahelix from the centre to
one end of the roller, the other half of the roller carrying a
helix symmetrical with the first with respect to the medium
plane of the roller
 Cheveron grooves are applied only on fed mill and top
rollers . They are never placed on delivery rollers becuase
they would not be any use as the delivery roller is under
force fed by the trash plate and the feed rollers
Mill grooves(photograph)
 3. Messchaerate Grooves( Juice Grooves)
 This are provided to achieve an important task of adequat
juice drainage
 They are formed by cutting circumferencial grooves and
make it deeper around the feed roller at intervals .
 Therefore at all points the juice can find an immediate way
out and can drain with out hindrance from any part of the
rooler.
 These are applied only on the feed rollers and bottom
rollers , never on the top and delivery rollers
 Different Auxillary Equipments To Mill

A. Trash plates
B. Scrappers
C. Hydraulic pressure ( mill hydraulic
loading )
D. Intermediate carriers
A. Trash plates
 To eliminate the clogging in V- shape of the grooves,trash
plates are engaged in to the feed rollers so as to scrape the
bagasse from the groove and their top surface is constantly
loaded by the bagasse passing from feeding opening to
delivery opening of the mill.

 This plate’s teeth must fit the grooves of the feed

rollers ,otherwise the feed rollers are packed by the bagasse
which inturn reduces the feeding ability of the rollers
B. Scrappers
 These scrapers are used to clean the bagasse which
has been compressed in the grooves of top ,delivery
and feed rollers . These are :
a) Top scraper for top roller grooves
b) Delivery scraper for delivery roller grooves
c) Messchaerate scrapers ( knives ) for the messchaert
grooves in the feed rollers
C. Hydraulic pressure ( mill hydraulic loading )
 The top roller should maintain a constant pressure
on the bagasse being milled .
 For this reason hydraulic pressure system is installed
to maintain this load as well as affording some form
of safety for the equipment in the event of the passage
of tramp iron or foreign materials .
D. Intermediate Carriers
• These are the conveyors which move the
bagasse from one mill to the next
Thank you

Questions ?