Press feed mechanism for products such as peanuts, grapes, cocoa beans, nuts, herbs and spices, and the like.

摘要

A peanut butter press feeding mechanism has a peanut supply hopper (3) which is controlled by a release gate (36) to supply a volumetric feeder. The volumetric feeder ensures that each of four intermediate holding hoppers at a peanut butter press are filled to capacity. A second release gate (37) controls the outlet of the volumetric feeder, which releases the peanuts into a totalizing scale which weighs peanuts supplied to all four of the intermediate holding hoppers. The totalizing scale supplies peanuts to a conveying arrangement having diverting gates which supply the appropriate intermediate holding hopper with a full supply of peanuts. During operation of the peanut butter press, a predetermined amount of oil is removed from the peanuts based upon the total weight of the peanuts used. This is necessary since merely knowing the volume of the peanuts used is insufficient due to the fluctuations in density of each batch of peanuts.