Plant sizes
- Tiny (lab scale) – 25 to 50 kg/hr
- Mini (farm scale) – 100 to 200 kg/hr
- Major (commercial) – 300 to 3,000 kg/hr
- Manual, semi-mechanised and automatic plants
Equipment used in aqua feed preparation
- Pulverizers – fine grinding improves digestibility, acceptability, mixing, pelletability and bulk density. Miracle Mills, micro pulverizers and turbo classifier mills are used; hammer mills are most efficient with dry, low-fat ingredients.
- Horizontal mixers/blenders – paddle-type interrupted ribbons suit mixing liquids with dry solids.
- Single-screw extruders – steam-injected cooking gelatinises starch for floating feed.
- Pelletizers – roller-and-die pellet mills, mainly for prawn feed.
- Dryers and coolers – vertical or horizontal; tray dryers for small production.
- Steam generator – about 60–90 kg/hr of steam at 100–150 psi for a 1.0–1.5 t/hr pellet mill.
- Crumblers and sifters – corrugated rolls break pellets into crumbles; oscillating sifters grade them.
- Elevators, conveyors, bins, silos, bag weighers and stitching machines.
