Prospects of improving technologies for apple raw materials processing

A resource-saving technology for processing apples, including the main production of finished dried products in the form of dried apples, apple chips, apple semi-finished products and additional production based on secondary raw materials recovery from the main production, were proposed in the work. The possibility of using of secondary raw materials from the apples industrial processing to obtain natural products that allows to make the main manufacture of dried apple products as efficient as possible was studied by the authors. The main directions of apples and secondary apple raw materials processing were considered in the work. The technological scheme of the line for apples and their wastes processing based on dehydration and moisture-thermal processing of components, taking into account the specifics of the production of dried fruits, chips and their semi-finished products, was proposed in the course of this study. The main production line for the manufacture of dried apples, apple chips and apple semi-finished products was designed. The resource-saving technological scheme of the dried apple and apple chips production line includes a washing machine, an inspection conveyor, a calibrator, a machine for seeds removing and a device for cutting fruits into chips, a sulfitator, a combined continuous toroidal apparatus for wet-heat treatment, divided into sections for raw materials heating, convective drying , preliminary hydrothermal treatment between sections of microwave drying and dried product cooling and a filling and packaging machine. Taking into account the type of raw materials, a set of equipment from a drum machine with a washing unit and a multifunctional plant with raw materials crushing and seeds separation was provided in the line. The recirculation circuit, the feedstock heating, the steam and condensate used after drying in a closed circuit were used to create an energy-saving technology for the finished product manufacturing. The line consists of modular blocks and is reconfigured depending on the type of dried apples or apple chips obtained based on the developed resource-saving scheme and combined convective microwave drying of raw materials.