Design and Development of an Automatic Soymilk Plant of 100 l/h Capacity

An automatic soymilk plant of capacity 100 l/h was developed. The main components of the plant were feeding and grinding unit, storage tanks, boiler unit, cooker, separator, pneumatic tofu press and control panel etc. The grinding system consisted of top hopper, feeder control plate, bottom hopper and grinder. The soy slurry from the grinder is collected and pumped to the cooker by screw pump assembly. The boiler operated by 12 kW heaters and cooker are connected by automatic pressure valve and release steam at desired temperature and pressure. The feed rate was controlled at 20 kg/h. At the pressure and temperature of the cooker of 250 kPa and 120 ºC, respectively, the cooking was maintained for 3 min. The separator separated the desired soymilk and okara. Soymilk prepared from automatic soymilk plant was compared with the other methods, namely traditional oriented method, airless grinding method and deodorization method for its quality parameter. In all, the quality parameters of soymilk prepared from automatic soymilk plant shown similar trends with that of airless grinding and deodorization methods. It indicated the successfulness of the soymilk plant for producing high quality milk.