GB284408A - Improvements in a process and apparatus for treating fresh fruits and vegetables - Google Patents

Abstract

284,408. Zellner, H. G. Oct. 29, 1926. Preserving fruit and vegetables. -Fruit and vegetables are sprayed, during a continuous translational and rotating movement, with a liquid which is cleansing, or preservative, or both, the excess liquid from the spray being collected and treated to remove matter carried off from the fruit or vegetables, and then reused. In the form described. for treating citrus fruit, the fruit is sprayed with a cleansing and preservative liquid from the nozzles 11 while being carried upward on an endless conveyer 2 formed of rollers 3 riding on strips 10 which causes them to rotate and rotate the fruit. A drip pan 14 conveys excess liquid in a collector. The fruit are next delivered by a chute 18 to longitudinally disposed inclined rotating scrubbing brushes 24, the cleansing and preservative liquid being sprayed thereon from nozzles 29. Excess liquid is conveyed by drip pan 22 to a collector 31. The treated fruit is passed by a conveyer 30 to drying apparatus and may subsequently be waxed and polished. The liquid is strained through screens 32 in collectors 31, and then passes through a pipe 34 to a settling tank 35 with baffles 36, 37, 39, and bowls 40, having plugs 41, for drawing off sediment. The liquid leaves through a pipe 38 to an inlet pipe 48 from which it flows through perforations 49 into a filter 44 and passes up through porous packing material therein, leaving through perforations 45 and a collecting trough 46 and spout 47. The bottom of the inlet pipe 48 is filled with gravel 50. The filtered liquid enters a supply tank 52 having baffles 53, 54, and bowls 55, with plugs 56, for removing sediment. The liquid is drawn off by a pump 60 from tank 52 through pipe 57 having a screened inlet 59 and by operating valves 64, 65, is delivered either direct to the supply pipes 12, 28 of the nozzles 11, 29 or first to a pressure filter 62, through pipe 61 and thence through pipe 63 to the pipes 12, 28.