Pictures of almond sheller

[stehansen]

Some of you know that I worked a seasonal job as a "shellerman" at a almond sheller this fall. Here are some pictures of the plant.
I'll see if I can get the pictures in the right order.
1. Trailers of field run almonds waiting to go into the plant
2. Trailer being unloaded
3. This is the huller/sheller mechanism. Inside there are two rollers which are adjustable and one roller rotates about 50% faster than the other. There are 22 of these and they are adjusted to get a little tighter on each one. Large almonds are shelled out early and small ones are shelled out later. Just as the product is leaving the sheller it goes through an air leg which sucks out the shell.
4. Under each sheller is a "deck" which is a shaking table with holes for the almonds to drop out (because they are smaller) and the hulls to ride out to the end of the table.
5. It then goes through a few more processes to sort the hulls, shells, unshelled almonds and almonds and a few dirt clods and misc trash that is left. It goes through this "gravity" table which sorts out hulls and almonds and dirt. Using shaking, air, and a tilt in the table with several adjustable exits for the product. These exits go to another gravity table, or a cracker, or another version of the gravity table called a fluidizer which shakes faster, or into the finished product belt.
6. the finished product is then elevated into a commidity trailer or can also be directed into a bin.
7. This is one of the hull piles outside. These are marketed to cattle feeding operations. The shells are in a similar pile and are sold as dairy bedding and to co-generation plants.
Almonds can be stockpiled and they cover these piles with plastic and in the last picture it shows some of these stockpiles and the unloading elevator which they used to make these piles.
My job was to let the field run product into the plant and keep tract of who it belongs to by keeping a log in the office and labeling the commidity trailer or bin with the info about the grower, variety, and field ID. Most of these trailers had a divider in the middle and two doors in the bottom allowing two lots per trailer.

 

[Thor's Hammer]

Pretty cool Steve. I would like to get me hands on a long term contract for all those shells...

 

[stehansen]

The plant generated about 2500 tons of shells and double that of hulls.

 

[canadiantreeman]

Cool!

 

[sotc]

Interesting

 

[stehansen]

I forgot something. When the plant is running the HP requirement is about 1500. To keep from having a huge power bill they installed solar panels. This would not pencil out of course if not for the government subsidies and mandates. The panels cover about 85% of the power used and the power is banked into the grid and then extracted during the season. The federal government covered 30% of the cost of the panels when construction was completed. The local power utility is also mandated by the state of California to have a percentage of their electricity supplied by "green" sources. I think it's 33%. So they paid for 50% of the cost of installing the system but they pay over a 5 year period so the huller has to finance that portion. I may be wrong about the percent that MID pays but I think it is 50%. The cost of the system was 2.6 million dollars. These panels tilt toward the east in the morning and then go flat in mid day then tilt to the west in the afternoon. They have to be washed a couple of times a year. With the power savings and the subsidies the system will be paid off in five years. The utility will only pay for the installation of a system that is estimated to be 85% of the customers projected usage. You can install a larger system but the utilitiy's participation ends at the 85%.
edit: The utility pays for this by adding about $8/month to the average Joe's power bill.
edit otro vez: Here is also a picture of the electrical switch panel. This was kind of fun. Usually when we would come in in the morning the plant would already be running by the graveyard shift but on Monday morning I would get to start up the plant. You push a start button on the top of each column and all the switches under it would also go on. The different sounds as each group of machines would start up is pretty cool.

 

[SoonerFan]

Do they have a plan to protect the panels if a hail storm is in the weather forecast?

 

[Paul B]

its simple, they dont allow hail storms in SoCal.

 

[CurSedVoyce]

HA!

 

[Treepreacher51]

Good question. Quite an investment to protect. We don't get any significant hail here in the valley though.

Where is that plant Steve? I drive by the Swanson plant in Hilmar every day. Prolly not as sophisticated as the one you work at. You did say MID so I'm guessin' it's Modesto or Oakdale??

 

[stig]

That is really interesting, Steve.
In my part of the world, we don't get sun enough for panels to be really effective.
So we'd probably look into converting the shells to energy instead of cattle feed.
Bet Ed would know if that was worth while.

 

[sotc]

We don't either Stig, thats where the government comes in

 

[gf beranek]

I always wondered how they did that. Thanks

 

[Thor's Hammer]

We don't either Stig, thats where the government comes in

Do tell...

Stig, Denmark gets more than enough sun to make solar pv work well. In the UK in the last 2 years, over a Gigawatt of PV has been installed and generating. And thats been fitted by roofers, joiners and electricians. Think how long it would take to build a nuclear or coal fired paower station that kicks out a Gigawatt.


If I owned that plant, I would put in a boiler and turbine, generate all the plants electricity using the waste, and export the surplus to grid. I would still have the solar panels too, as they offset peak loading on the grid, and the more green power the better.

 

[stehansen]

Dennis, we get hail about every other year or so and it is usually almost like snow. The largest hail I have ever seen was like rock salt. Ed, part of the shells go for co-generation. There is a burner at a lumber mill in Chinese Camp about 45 miles away. I looked up the hull price on the feed and grain report and the price was $103/ton. I would bet the shell price is less than a fourth of that. The hulls and shells are in separate piles. The shells are pulled out by air legs. Ed, a local retired doctor tried to start a co-generation plant to burn orchard pruning and orchard chips from removal in Modesto and the environmental wackos raised such a ruckus at the meetings of the local utility who would buy the juice that the utility declined to sign a contract and without such contract the doctor guy couldn't secure his financing. The wackos are retarded because now instead of the chips being burned here, they are hauled 45 miles away and then burned.

 

[Thor's Hammer]

That's a real shame Steve. Can't comment on what system he might have used, but on a system I advised on in London, the stack emissions were cleaner than the air at ground level. My system will have an electrostatic filter and baghouse filter plant.

 

[stehansen]

I don't know any of those details either Ed, but the Central Valley is a natural smog trap so our emission regulations are more stringent than the feds and I assume that this plant would be as clean burning as possible. It would qualify for the same 30% federal subsidy that the solar panels were. They went on and on about the CO2 emissions. Well the carbon is still being put back into the atmosphere, only 45 miles away and emissions from the trucks to haul it up there are being added to it. That's the level of retardation we're dealing with.

 

[Treepreacher51]

Where is that plant Steve? I'm guessin' it's Modesto or Oakdale??

.

 

[stehansen]

It's in Modesto, on Hwy 132 about three miles west of Carpenter Rd. The corner of 132 and Dakota.