An extraction machine for tomato seeds was designed, locally fabricated and evaluated. The performance of the designed extraction machine was evaluated based on seed loss, extraction efficiency, cleaning efficiency and energy requirements. The evaluation was calculated at different operation conditions including different crushing/separation speeds from 1.31 to 3.66 m/s, feed rates from 6o to 240 kg/h and inclination angle of extraction unit from 0 to 12 deg. The obtained results concluded that:
· Increasing or decreasing the crushing/separating drum speed more or less than 2.88 m/s and increasing or decreasing the inclination angle of extraction machine more or less than 8 deg were observed to cause an increase in seed losses, consequently caused a decrease in both of seed cleaning efficiency and seed extraction efficiency at any given feeding rates.
· The seed losses were found to be proportional to feeding rate. However, the seed cleaning efficiency, seed extracting efficiency and required energy were found to be inversely proportional to the feeding rate.
· Using the study variable combinations of 2.88 m/s crushing/separating drum speed and 8 deg inclination angle gave the maximum values of seed extraction efficiency 95.20, 93.46, 92.60 and 90.73 % at feeding rates of 60, 120, 180 and 240 kg/h, respectively.
· Increasing the crushing/separating drum speed from1.31 to 3.66 m/s decreased the required energy from 11.04 to 16.90 kW.h/ton at a feed rate of 60 kg/h and inclination angle of 8 deg. Utilizing the designed tomato seed extraction machine proved to be very cost effective and was able to save more than 37% in extraction cost.