IMPROVED DESIGN AND PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF SOAP STAMPING AND TABLETING MACHINE FOR SMALL SCALE MANUFACTURERS FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

2.4 Description and Mode of Operation of the Existing Machines               10

                                                   LIST OF TABLES

In chemistry, soap is a salt of fatty acid. Soap requires two major raw materials: fat and alkali, this is because all soap is made from fats and oils, mixed with alkaline (basic) solutions. This alkaline solution is usually sodium hydroxide or Potassium hydroxide. Where, the base-alkali is Potassium, the soap is more water soluble and it is called soft soap. There are many kinds of fats and oils, both animal and vegetable. At room temperature, fats appear in solid form while oils are liquid in nature. In modern soap making, processed fats in the form of fatty acids are utilized. The use of this agent eliminates many impurities, and have water as byproduct rather than glycerin. Furthermore, in soap making vegetable based oils, such as palm kernel oil, olive oil and coconut oil, are also used (www.madehow). Additives, which include fragrance are used to enhance the texture, colour and scent of the soap (Solomon, 2015). In addition, abrasives are employed to enhance soap texture and they include talc, silica, and marble pumice (www.madehow). Soap can be coloured or produced without colour addition. In recent times, soap manufacturers apply colouring agents to soap so as to make it more enticing to the consumer.

The production of soaps comes in different shapes, sizes, colours and qualities depending on their specific uses and manufacturers (Chukwuma, 2005). However, soaps produced by different manufacturers may have identical shapes and sizes especially when the shape is not part of the manufacturer’s trade mark. As a result of the problem of product identification, large scale manufacturers register some unique shape of their logo in the body of the products to enable its identification (Jones, 2000). Stamping (printing of identification marks) and tableting (shaping and sizing) of manufactured soaps are done in industrial scale using automated manufacturing systems while most small and medium soap producers use hand stamps and mould/cutting devices.

However, as a result of the desire for soap tableting and stamping machine by small scale soap producers, Ojebo (2010) developed a manually operated soap tableting and stamping machine for those categories of soap producers. But due to its tedious nature of operations, Ajoa (2011) development of equipment for homemade operated laundry. This machine has three units, the pedal powered soap mixer unit, the mould unit, made of wood for holding of liquid bar soaps and the cutting and stamping unit which is our area of interest in this study. The impression mark stamped is flaky with minute blister and rough as a result of the deforming action of the roller stamp and finally this machine lacks the ability to shape tablet. Echidime (2011) developed a motorized model of the machine to reduce human intervention in this process. Although, the motorized soap cutting and stamping machine in the set of equipment developed by Echidime (2011) makes the act of cutting and stamping easy, faster and neater than using ordinary knife and manual stamping machine, the cutting and stamping operations were done at different region in the same machine unlike the manual stamping and tableting machine produced by Ojebo (2010) that cuts and stamps at the same time/region which reduce inconsistency in the output and enhanced portability due to its small size. The motorized model also makes use of two electric motors thereby consumes more energy. 

Furthermore, in an attempt to reduce energy consumption and size, Asiegbu (2014) developed a single motor driven soap stamping and tableting machine that also can be operated manually in the absent of electricity. However, this machine did not solve the problem of product identification by unique shape and size, stylized with the imprint of the manufacturer’s trademark and the desired aesthetics. However Kililiku (2016) designed a bar soap making machine for local soap manufactures. This machine extrudes the soap noodles into a rectangular soap die. This machine neither tablets, stamps nor shape the soap bars. Thus, the need for a more portable single electric motor driven soap shaping, tableting and stamping machine that can cut, stamp and shape a soap tablet simultaneously to the manufacture’s taste, which consumes less energy and thus ejects the soap after the entire operations.

A major constraint in soap production for small and medium scale soap manufactures is difficulty in tableting, stamping and shaping for unique product identification. However in the past, manual method of tableting with a knife edge and stamping with a hand stamp has been developed, but this method is quite laborious, time consuming, lacks precision and consistency and is not commercially viable. On a bid to solve this problem, Ojebo (2010) developed a manually operated soap tableting and stamping machine. This machine was very tedious to operate, although mechanized, but still faced the same problem confronting the manual method of hand stamping. Consequently, this gave rise to the development of a motorized soap stamping and tableting machine by Echidime (2011) and Asiegbu (2014) respectively. But none of these machines were able to shape the soap to bring about unique product identification in terms of shape and stamping. Hence this gives rise to the need for the development of an integrated soap tableting, stamping and shaping machine for small and medium scale soap manufactures.

The aim of this study is to design and performance evaluation of soap stamping and tableting machine for small scale manufacturers. The specific objectives are;

This study involves design modification, fabrication, performance and cost analysis of an integrated soap stamping, tableting and shaping machine.

Development of soap stamping and tableting machine will be of great relief to small and medium scale soap manufacturers and marketers, as it makes for much availability of the product in large quantity. The machine tablet, stamp, shape and ejects the soap. This innovation is to encourage youths to engage in small and medium scale production of soap, being stress free and at the same time have high return on investment.