Industrial Engineering Letters www.iiste.org ISSN 2224-6096 (Paper) ISSN 2225-0581 (online) Vol.5, No.5, 2015 52 Development of Manually Operated Orange Peeling Device for Domestic Use Nuhu A. Ademoh Department of Mechanical Engineering, Federal University of Technology, P. M. B. 65, Minna, Nigeria E-mail: nuhuadam@yahoo.com Tijani A. Akaba Department of Mechanical Engineering, Kaduna Polytechnic, Kaduna, Nigeria E-mail: akabatijani@yahoo.com Abstract Orange a very rich source of vitamin C is a perishable fruit that can only be stored unpreserved for few days before its biological degeneration. When processed to juice, the chemical preservatives that are usually added coupled with the contaminations by its back skin fluid instantly change its natural flavor. This has made many consumers to still prefer freshly peeled fruit to its processed juice. As a solution to laborious hand peeling process that is highly prone to injury due to the sharp tools used several devices have been developed for its peeling. Each of these has its own technical, economic and other shortcomings. This work designed and fabricated a manual orange peeling device with a capability of processing oranges for a domestic family household. The device incorporated a rotary handle through which power was introduced into the system, power screw, spur gear train mounted on a base and cutting blade that performed the peeling function. The fabricated device was operated and assessed to have a peeling efficiency of 97%, generated 2.6% over peeled and damaged oranges and a capacity to peel about 140 oranges per hour as compared to hand peeling that can produce 32 peeled oranges per hour. It is robust, simple to operate and maintain, had good aesthetics and light weight of 619g due to transparent light but strong plastics used to construct the frame and base. Keywords: Orange, peeling, device, household, juice. 1.0 INTRODUCTION An orange is a type of citrus fruit that is eaten by all races of people all over the world. Oranges are round/oval shaped coloured thick back covered fruits that are borne on trees of 1-10meters high initially originating from Asia and now grown in virtually all parts of the world. The inside of orange is divided into segmented lobes with seeds called pips; all bounded by tough shiny back covering skin. The outer covering skin and inside segments are separated by white stringy stuff called pitch. In most types of oranges, the back skin can be peeled off the pitch and the segments pulled apart with human finger. For instance, with mandarin orange species, the skin, pitch and segments can easily be pulled apart. In some other types this manual separation of orange back skin called orange peel, pitch and segments is not readily possible. The fruit of citrus sinensis, called sweet orange to distinguish it from citrus aurantium, bitter orange is the species of orange mostly consumed today because of its good source of many vitamins especially vitamin C, which is one of the essential minerals needed for good human health (www.abecitrus.com:Br/process.html). Orange trees are widely cultivated in tropical and sub-tropical climates of the world where they are reported to grow well and yield fruits abundantly for commercial and industrial purposes, such that over 68.5 million tones of oranges were reportedly produced in Brazil, United States of America in 2008 (www.ehow.com, 2013). Orange is used in many industrial/commercial forms like; dehydrated orange juice powder used as flavour, colour, nutritive additives in many bakery and other products, orange grated peel in flavouring and essential oil in food, soft drink and candy; juice sacks obtained after juice extraction called finisher pulp (dried to less than 10% moisture) is used as emulsifier and binder in food and beverage industries; orange peel oil containing 90-95% lemon content is used as lethal insecticide on housefly, flea, and fire ants and as engines cleaners and waterless hand cleaners in heavy machinery repair shops (www.ehow.com, 2013). Orange is a highly perishable fruit that can be stored for 3-5 months at 11.11-3.89 0 C; after which it deteriorates due to transpiration, losses of moisture in peel/pulp (www.storagewest.com/orange.htm). In order to prevent abundant after harvest wastages oranges are processed into juices, concentrates, fruit powder e.t.c, packaged in industries for sales and human consumption. However, due to taste modification by chemical preservatives and contamination during processing, many people still prefer freshly peeled fruits (Cailliot S., 1990). Peeling oranges is not an easy task as there are several problems that can be encountered during the process. One of the problems is that orange has round shape meaning that it must be tightly gripped to prevent it from rotation during peeling. The thick outer skins of oranges demand that it can only be peeled with sharp tools like knives, making the process prone to injury to hand. Another problem associated with orange peeling process is breakage of cellulose juice bearers leading to lose of juice. Because of the bitter and unpleasant fume/juice