Olive trees are among the oldest known cultivated trees in the world. It is thought that the botanical progenitor of olive tree is wild tree.
The aim of this research is to development a grading machine according to the physical and mechanical properties of olive fruits.
The main results in this study can be summarized in the following points:
The maximum fruit damage of 2.8 to 3.9 and 3 to 4.1 %, for fruit sizes 20, 25 mm and total 6.7 to 9.5 and.3 to 9.8 %, for Azzezy and Toffahy cultivars respectively,were obtained with grading speed of 8 rpm ( 0.08 m/s) and feeding rate of 20 kg. Meanwhile, the minimum fruit-damage of 3.1 and 3.3 %, total 6.4 and 7.3 % for Azzezy and Toffahy cultivars respectively, 20 mm fruit sizes was obtained with grading speed of 11 rpm (0.12 m/s), and feeding rate of 5 kg .
The maximum range of grading-machine productivity for olive fruits of 113 – 836 and 125 – 920 kg/h for Azzezy and Toffahy cultivars respectively,was obtained with grading speed range of 5 - 14 rpm (0.05 – 0.15 m/s) and feeding rate of 20 kg. Meanwhile, the minimum range of grading-machine productivity for olive fruits of 101– 682 and 111 - 750 kg/h for Azzezy and Toffahy cultivarswas obtained with grading speed range of 5 - 14 rpm (0.05 – 0.15 m/s) and feeding rate of 5 kg.
The operation and production costs were 7.37 L.E./h and and 67, 9.7 L.E./ton forAzzezyand 62.4 , 8.9 L.E./ton forToffahy at optimum conditions (grading speed of 11 rpm or 0.12 m/s and feeding rateof 10 kg).