The feather meal production line is mainly for processing puffed feather meal particles. The feather puffing extruder is the main equipment of the feather meal production line. The puffed feather meal processing line adds cleaned animal feathers to the puffing machine. Utilizing the high temperature, high pressure, and shearing effect in the puffing extruder, the feathers are instantly subjected to high temperature and certain catalyst action during the expansion. The solid space structure of the feather keratin protein is destroyed when the ejection hole is decompressed and expanded. The water content of feather meal after puffing is about 30%~35%. Then use the dryer to dry the feather meal to less than 10% to make high-quality animal protein feed.

What is the feather meal?

Feather meal refers to the non-deteriorated feathers obtained after slaughtering livestock and poultry, such as chicken feathers, goose feathers, duck feathers, pigeon feathers, turkey feathers, etc., processed into animal protein feed through modern technology. Feather meal can be divided into enzymatically hydrolyzed feather meal, hydrolyzed feather meal, and puffed feather meal according to the production method.

Feather meal is a commonly used protein feed material, and its crude protein content is not less than 75%. The amino acid content of glycine, serine, and isoleucine is very high, reaching 6.3%, 9.3%, and 5.3% respectively, which is suitable for compounding with raw materials with insufficient isoleucine content (such as blood meal). In many developed countries, 2% to 3% feather meal is used in all livestock and poultry feeds. Therefore, feather meal is one of the important sources of protein in poultry feed.

Applications of puffed feather meal

The puffed feather powder has a uniform texture, looseness and fragrance, good palatability, and fluidity. Feather meal contains about 75%-90% of crude protein, which can make the digestion and absorption rate of protein by animals reach over 85%.

The feed value of feather meal is actually not high, and it is mainly used to supplement the content of thioine in animal feed. However, feather meal has a significant effect on breeding, which is to reduce the phenomenon of anal pecking and feather pecking in chickens and ducks. This is because feather meal is rich in sulfur-containing amino acids.

Feeding feather meals to poultry such as chickens, ducks and other poultry in the spring and autumn molting season is conducive to the growth and development of their down. It should be noted that the amount of feather meal in the poultry diet should not exceed 3% to 5%, and it should be mixed with other protein feeds containing lysine, methionine, and tryptophan. In the feather meal production line, the feathers can be decomposed after pressure and heating treatment, which improves the nutritional value of feather protein and makes feather meal a useful protein resource.

Components of the feather meal production line

The industrial feather meal processing line is a collective name for a series of processing equipment, mainly including elevators, feather puffing extruder machines, conveyors, feather meal crushers, dryers, dust collectors, deodorizing equipment, etc. The processing technology of puffed feather powder mainly includes feather cleaning, feather drying, feather puffing, feather paste crushing and drying, feather meal powder packaging, and so on.

Machine list of the puffed feather meal production line

Machine name	Machine parameters	Machine picture
Feather puffing extruder	Main motor power: 75kw Transmission power: 3.0kw Heating power: 23kw Weight: 3500kg Output: 350-450kg/h Host size: 3580*2200*1050mm Conveyor dimensions: 4850*800*2100mm
U type conveyor	Power: 2.2kw Output: 600-800kg/h Weight: 260kg Dimensions: 5000*380*400mm
Screw conveyor	Power: 2.2kw Output: 1500-2000kg/h Weight: 105kg Dimensions: 2500*450*700mm
Feather meal grinder	Power: 15kw Output: 450-600kg/h Weight: 320kg Dimensions: 1600*1150*1300mm
Dust collector	Power: 0.75kw Output: 600-700kg/h Weight: 160kg Dimensions: 850*900*1400mm
Feather meal storage bin	Capacity: 1.5-2m³ Weight: 190kg Dimensions: 1500*1700*1900mm
Deodorant Tower	Fan power: 2.2kw Pump power: 2.2kw Effective volume: 2.6m³ Weight: 820kg Dimensions: 1450*1250*3150mm
Bag type dust removal and purification equipment(optional)	Fan power: 7.5kw Processing capacity: 60-100m³/h Weight: 320kg Dimensions: 3200*1250*1200mm
Activated carbon box	Processing capacity: 40-70m³/h Weight: 140kg Dimensions: 2200*750*1100mm

Features of the feather meal production line

1. The poultry feathers used for processing feather meal must be clean and undegraded feathers, and must not be adulterated with sand, stone or metal. If the customer’s feather raw materials are not clean, you can consider using feather cleaning equipment and drying equipment to pre-treat and pre-treat the raw materials.
2. The quality of the puffed feather meal produced by the feather meal puffing process is generally reflected by the sterilization rate and digestibility. During the puffing process, the puffing temperature of the feather puffing extruder and the particle size of the feather powder can be arbitrarily set by the workers. When the puffing temperature and the feather powder particle size in puffing are set improperly, it will directly affect the quality of puffed feather powder. Therefore, determining an appropriate process parameter is extremely critical to the production process of puffed feather meal.
3. The puffing temperature of feather puffing extruder can be set between 160℃ and 220℃. The user should determine the puffing temperature of feathers and the particle size of feather powder according to the specific feather raw materials and the freshness of the raw materials.
4. The output of the feather meal production line can be customized according to the specific needs of customers. Usually its output ranges from 500kg/h to 5t/h. Our factory can provide customers with suitable feather meal processing solutions according to their processing needs and investment budget.
5. The deodorizing tower and other purification equipment are installed in the feather meal processing line to filter and purify the gas generated during the feather meal processing. It can not only purify the air in the production workshop, but also prevent air pollution.