APPARATUS FOR PREPARING ANIMAL FOOD PELLETS

摘要

Apparatus for preparing animal food pellets wherein cooked mash under atmospheric pressure is forced through a die wherein the mash has been cooked under superatmospheric pressure. More specifically, the apparatus provides means defining a continuous flow path for mash including conditioning means in said path for cooling said mash under super-atmospheric pressure, means next in said path for tangentially forcing said mash through orifices of a rotating die to form deaerated rods of substantially uniform consistency across successive transverse planes and characterized by the substantial absence of fracture on the lagging side of the ribbon and means next in said path for transversely severing the ribbons to form pellets, said conditioner means being constructed and arranged to confine the mash in a steam atmosphere is the range of about 1 psi to about 25 psi. The unique pressure cooking of the mash eliminates the operator guesswork of prior art conditioning steps and results in a mash which is dearated and considerably more plastic.