The Cooking Oil Press is used to squeeze oil out of oil-bearings seeds and nuts. The press is manually operated and can be ordered with different cage bar spacing to suit different sizes and types of seed. The smaller or softer the seed, the smaller the gap between the bars in the cage.
Capacity The throughput of the press is nominally 100 Kg per day. This represents a "cycle time" of 7 to 8 seconds. If it is operated at about 5 seconds per stroke the though put will be up to 130 Kg. When you speed up, the recovery rate of the oil drops a bit, but it produces more total oil per day.
If 100 Kg of hybrid sunflower seed is pressed in a day, you can expect 25 to 33 liters of raw oil to be pressed out. This has to be settled in buckets, drums or other containers for a week or more. This will yield about 18 to 25 liters of pure, cold pressed oil. The residue (called seed cake) is a very valuable dairy cattle feed supplement worth about 2/3 of the price of the seed per kg.
Operation The hopper is loaded with about 7.5 Kg of seed. The handle is raised to be vertical. The seed feeds into the cylinder. The handle is lowered to about waist level where it will stop falling. Press down firmly and rapidly on the handle until it is about 250mm off the floor. This loads a charge of seed into the cage. Pause very briefly by taking some weight off the handle and then continuing pressing it slowly down to the floor. It is during this last part of the action that the oil is squeezed out. If you press slowly the whole time, the oil will back up into the seed hopper and the wet seed will not fall into the cylinder without being assisted by hand. The seed feeds well if the motion is correct.
The press is operated by two or three people. The handle presses down to the ground on one side and then is passed over the top to another operator on the other side. This gives them a rest as they take turns pressing the handle down. The resistance of the handle can be set by shimming the automatic choke plug. Whether operated fast or slow, the pressure inside the cage remains the same at all times. The third person can stand in the center and help pass the handle back and forth. This reduces the walking by both operators to almost nil. They can continue pressing for several hours without needing a rest.
Seeds The oil content has to be comparatively high - about 35% or more - to work effectively. Suitable seeds are sunflower, sesame, caster and a few others. Not suitable are cotton seed, soya beans and unhusked neem seeds. The most common seed to be pressed on a small scale is sunflower. There are more than 100 varieties of sunflower and their oil content varies from one to another so be careful you are planting or buying a seed with a high oil content.
Technical information The fully hardened piston is self-lubricating. The patented choke ring above the cage breaks up the seed while heating it with mechanical energy. The choke ring can be changed for different amounts of choking to work the seed properly. The cage can be dismantled without anything more than an iron bar which is used to lift the 3 rings. The cage bars separate easily for cleaning. This is a unique feature of this press. No spanners are required for normal maintenance. A sharpened rod is good for digging out hardened cake if it is left for too long without being used and the operator forgot to clean it. Having only 3 moving parts ensures a long service life. The main shaft is mounted on ball bearings. The handle is 1.8 meters long.
Piston Dia............................40mm Stroke.................................105mm Operating psi.......................up to 1250 psi Spring sizes are 11mm for new seed, 10mm for old seed (1-2 yrs).
This item ships from Africa. Please call or email for a shipping quote.
Cooking Oil Press 
The Cooking Oil Press is used to squeeze oil out of oil-bearings seeds and nuts. The press is manually operated and can be ordered with different cage bar spacing to suit different sizes and types of seed. The smaller or softer the seed, the smaller the gap between the bars in the cage.